Missing Buttons
When happiness is just a memory I see my father cutting the cord, I feel myself being held up by a strength not my own, a feeling I’d forgotten, (how long has it been since I didn’t have to stand on my own two feet?), I remember my mother’s hands, warm and heavy, the first time she held me, I remember my mother’s arms and the last time she took me into them. I look at my hands and see in them all that I’ve done, what I never thought possible, what I never imagined necessary, what I never dreamed they’d be let do.
I see us at the beginning. I remember feeling as if you had set me aside, and to this day I wonder why I would think that, it was a hope soon crushed. I remember proving to you that I was different, that you could be yourself with me and I wouldn’t leave you. To you people are either flawless or begging for a paper bag. What am I if there is no gray area to your affection? I wondered at first if I deserved to be with you at all, a question I ask now in a completely different manner.
I know now that I’m no different to you than the rest. You’ll tear me apart until I have to leave, too, and you’ll blame me for it all, call me weak, stupid, useless, cold hearted. When I am pleasing you, you grace me with a smile I could see without eyes. Can you feel the cold of my aching hurt when you hold me close? Do you wonder why I turn away?
I tiptoe around your ego like a mother would a restless child and I rock your worries to sleep. But I wonder, do you need me at all? You hold me close only when there’s no one else you’d rather. Your silence does not count as truth, it is a lie of convenience you tell to deny me the right of anger. You ask me to remain unspoken, to not ruin this trembling connection with words and questions but words are what cement my reality. Were you listening when I told you of my hurt and why it was? Was it not enough to tell you the little I could?
I’ve said too much for you now, but in this mind of mine, it’s a mere beginning. I’m tired of talking about you and thinking about me. I want to be us. But does it still exist? Can it remain forever as we have wished together it would?
You have placed the heart I see through you to so clearly again into the clutch of someone else, and I miss the warm, wet weight of it in my hands. Can you feel mine growing cold as you read my words? Or is it long since dusty on your shelf?
I see us at the beginning. I remember feeling as if you had set me aside, and to this day I wonder why I would think that, it was a hope soon crushed. I remember proving to you that I was different, that you could be yourself with me and I wouldn’t leave you. To you people are either flawless or begging for a paper bag. What am I if there is no gray area to your affection? I wondered at first if I deserved to be with you at all, a question I ask now in a completely different manner.
I know now that I’m no different to you than the rest. You’ll tear me apart until I have to leave, too, and you’ll blame me for it all, call me weak, stupid, useless, cold hearted. When I am pleasing you, you grace me with a smile I could see without eyes. Can you feel the cold of my aching hurt when you hold me close? Do you wonder why I turn away?
I tiptoe around your ego like a mother would a restless child and I rock your worries to sleep. But I wonder, do you need me at all? You hold me close only when there’s no one else you’d rather. Your silence does not count as truth, it is a lie of convenience you tell to deny me the right of anger. You ask me to remain unspoken, to not ruin this trembling connection with words and questions but words are what cement my reality. Were you listening when I told you of my hurt and why it was? Was it not enough to tell you the little I could?
I’ve said too much for you now, but in this mind of mine, it’s a mere beginning. I’m tired of talking about you and thinking about me. I want to be us. But does it still exist? Can it remain forever as we have wished together it would?
You have placed the heart I see through you to so clearly again into the clutch of someone else, and I miss the warm, wet weight of it in my hands. Can you feel mine growing cold as you read my words? Or is it long since dusty on your shelf?