[five words that would change everything,]
'i can't cradle my innocence blindly, with eyes wide shut, hoping you'd tie the knot around the pendulum tight enough so i wouldn't crumble,' I spoke the words in a poetic tongue, but with each syllable, you inched further more into the horizon. Eventually, your face became nothing more than an image stamped with ink upon my bedroom door. & that's why in reality, I couldn't commit to tell you the
-baby steps to another disaster;
i. I find myself taking deep breaths when I feel numbness amputate my bloodstream. That's when I know you'll depict the lock to rummage through the unwashed memories left on broken hangers behind the chasms in my mind. You figured me out again, and that's when I knew my life would never be the same. Rubber bands tighten against my joints to inform me that you're here, & I have you in the palm of my hand until the clock strikes midnight, and even though you aren't mine, having you now was more than enough.
ii. I placed my imagination in-between my hands, and allowed myself to completely stretch it out far enough until I could detect the slightest gram of hope shifting behind the rocks or empty caverns lingering throughout my soul. Eventually, I became frazzled of craving a basic uncertainty, when there was nothing between us to inhale without becoming hysterical. Yet you inched closer to my quavering and terrified body, and took my vulnerability into your advantage. The ice crystals forming around the cornea of my hazel eyes were melting second after second, but I bit my lip and left my bangs to dangle over my fragile face, so you wouldn't recognize the pain.
-that was my worst mistake;
iii. To contract myself into my bedroom, dead-bolt the door, and stare at myself in the mirror as my eyes over-flooded with the words you spilled into my ear canal, made me realize that you really weren't worth fighting for. But I kept trying anyway. Every time your voice trailed somewhere around the center of my ribs and ricocheted to the center of my heart, I'd take my emotions to a paper shredder and then shove them in your face; impossible to read, but you knew they were there. & maybe I just didn't have the strength to continue giving.
iv. You carry a sturdy and heavy-burdened reputation. Naturally, you're 'flirtatious' and 'betwitching', but I knew that from the first day I met you. I tried to revolve our petty moments around who you were, and nail it into my skull that I was only reading into this too much, but then you tugged at possibilities, and I got entangled in your web of countless miscalculations. We took one step too far, and no matter how many times I reset the clock, I was stuck with today.
-you wanted more than i could give;
v. Tossed behind a shelf, crumbled and intertwined with old sonnets to when I was willing to fully give myself to you, when I'd contemplate on the last seven months like it was yesterday, and I only end up sighing at all I could've said, & all you could've done. Now, it's all about questioning my motives and why I wear the frown I do when you walk across shards of glass instead of putting your frustrations to rest. It was you opened the door to the 'comfort zone', and stapled a tag to our lives; we cared, but we were afraid to know to what extent.
vi. So you only push me into awkward positions and glue your mouth shut so I'm tampering between right from wrong, and you're balanced between love and a dim possibility for something more. I want you to want me to let you go;
because I don't think I can do this on my own.♥
Honorable mention
Silver trophy winner
Bronze trophy winner
Adding your comment:
seriously, that means a lot.
