I could not write it -

the letter would scream.

Ink cannot hold her name

without bleeding into madness.

I could not say it -

my heart would burst

My throat cannot hold that feeling

without choking into the abyss.

Love when unrequited,

does it take on another form?

Love when unrequited,

does it become a growing hunger?

I'm so addicted to her love

that I ate the moon,

let it melt against my throat,

cold and burning.

To kill it inside me,

I consumed her absence.

Inch by inch, step by step

It grew into me -

In the quietest corners of rooms,

In the coldest side of the bed,

In the pause between the breaths,

In the entirety of my dreams.

She lives now,

in the pit of my stomach

a second heartbeat

bruising everything I eat.

The world calls it poetry.

I call it survival.