Like Last Summer

Late July, last Summer
My shoes were going out of fashion
Living was easy, life was good for us
There was none of this -

Those hospital visits;
Crowded corridors, stale waiting rooms
Sleeping with the light
still on.

Summer turned to winter
And I stopped speaking to you
My mouth filled with empty, harmless words
Not quite lies, not quite truth
I couldn’t explain the nightmares.

I sat on benches
On crowded streets
Never feeling more alone,
never less complete.
The seasons carried on
and it seemed strangely unfair
I thought perhaps the world might
stop for us, for what we’d lost.

Still, life went on
Nothing changed,
Night still followed day
Life carried on making life
that cycle I could never be part of
That act I broke my heart over
That emptiness,
They just can’t understand.

Christmas, when I started
losing my hair
I lost all my faith
Still, I couldn’t tell you.

And now,
I no longer own my body
I didn’t ask for this
For this loss of control.

Those crowded corridors,
I walk them blindfolded now
Learning, at 21
That doctors don’t care
when they casually mention
those words.

Still a taboo -
as though it makes me less of a person.

I cut my hair
I told you, showed you
You didn’t seem surprised that I
was falling apart.

Late July, last Summer
We had no idea,

Last summer
…Before I went out of fashion.

(c) 2006.

 

 

Lanterns

I stand alone,
but not quite secluded,
in a comfortable peace I never knew I could feel.

I consider.

All that I could be
if I just tried harder.

Everything I used to be,
something I now regret.

Who I am,
and who I’ve let down.

I stand at the window,
a different place than it ever used to be,
something so wrong, turned so right.

5 minutes past midnight
with tiny lights above my head.

A long-empty bottle to remind me,
and a cigarette,
as always.

Forgive me.

My thoughts turn to you.

To us.

And the things which always
meant more.

Tiny lanterns hang in the sky,
despite it all.

(c)

.