(no subject)

[tbopalu]

it’s a strange feeling to have my heart occupy so many places at once. Perhaps it is not so much in many places, but stretched between them. When I was little, I had the naïve notion that there was only enough heart in my chest for one person. But as I have loved over the years, to varying degrees and intensities, I have learned that this is not the case. I now think that this tightness in my chest is not an emptiness or a void, but a stretching. My heart is being pulled in so many directions, and that is where the difficulty, the pain, and the beauty all lie. From eight miles south, he has held on the longest, and tightest, refusing to let go. The measure of the grasp has varied, and there have been moments when I thought he was on the verge of letting go. Now, however, his hold is steady and persistent and comforting. Yet he claims an unequal segment, and at times I wish he would let go. One took my heart quickly and intensely and quite unexpectedly, didn’t mean to grab so tight, but stretched me four thousand miles to the northeast, so far that I actually felt my heart begin to tear. Another took hold twice and let go twice. My heart still feels the reverberations of that part coiling back into place. My heart is loosely held by one more and the uncertainty makes it uneasy.
It is this stretching, this pulling, this unbelievable tautness, that makes it hard to breathe sometimes. The slightest weight on my heart feels so heavy, and I don’t know how much more my heart can extend.