[Time a vessel but the sea always distant and the coast unclear as the skies brooding o'erhead.]
Not jealousy or some teenage angst that, tardy though it is, insists upon asserting itself in the cold cavity of her emptied-vessel chest. Treasure not to be found, gold never to glint, to the murky bottom our unelegant diver sinks, letting the airtank and the mask and the flippers free to flit to the surface, leaving behind a resigned mistress who tests her legs and finds them incapable of swimming, of carrying her back to the land she once knew and once threw herself upon eager to test the ground's firmness.
Only love knows my dying gasps; it went down with me, this love; it was my anchor not my life preserver; Jason was neither anchor nor life preserver, only a witness to madness that at least hid half its ugly face, thus sparing him that horror. I deserve to be shut out entirely and he ought to slam the door on my fingers--maybe on my arm, destroying that heart I have carelessly worn on my sleeve. Idiot a stamp on my forehead.
Only love knows my dying gasps; it went down with me, this love; it was my anchor not my life preserver; Jason was neither anchor nor life preserver, only a witness to madness that at least hid half its ugly face, thus sparing him that horror. I deserve to be shut out entirely and he ought to slam the door on my fingers--maybe on my arm, destroying that heart I have carelessly worn on my sleeve. Idiot a stamp on my forehead.