Aftermath

I miss you
But this is not the proper miss or
a part of some of the superficial things that you do.
I fell in love with something.
Something was embedded in your character.
Something was right there behind your eyes.

I thought that I could smooth myself
Over the cracks in your self esteem.
I thought I could wedge my fingernails under the crust
That you formed allowing you to adapt
To this nuclear wasteland.
I thought I could press you between my warm fingers
Until the wall you built melted.

I thought, I could prise this penny from the sidewalk.
I thought, I could collect you and pin you down.
I thought I could.

Maybe it was pointless, you were too far in there.
Maybe I gave up too soon.
Maybe I was jealous. Perhaps I was jealous.
Maybe, when I pulled you from them, I thought,
I could jump in myself
And draw them around me in a blanket of (false) security.

I fell in love with something in you,
Something I wasn’t able to save in time.
But I couldn’t hold my breath any longer;
I had to breathe.

It was selfish. I get it.
I miss you. I’m sorry.
I know that the you in you would hear that.

I can’t explain now. I wish I could.
But this was something, not wrong with you
specifically or
something wrong with them in general.
This was the problem with “we”, with the “us”,
The “together” that I never fully felt or understood.
So I had to leave.

My dad says that there will always be people in this world whom you will not like but will have to get along with anyway.
I’m not good at this and that got in the way.
I’m not sure if what I did was right
but I know it was wrong for you. And again, I’m sorry.

This is what I meant.
I know it took a while, missed glances, angry words, and some tears,
At least on my end.

But I’m here to tell you.
I tried to pull something through you
and behind that bulk of something, in the shadow of that something,
I lost sight of us.
I was that lighthouse that blinked in and out, drawing you in.
Blinking,
until one day, I never returned your light
and left you blinking in the dark.