The Quiet Wisdom

It's too hard saying goodbye again.

With burnt fingertips I reached for your face

We used art to paint ourselves into a corner together. We made a cage out of labels and handwriting, created wings on our backs, but collars around our necks. We didn’t realize the monsters we were creating, how unlovable, unrecognizable we’d become to anyone but each other. We relished in it, but we’ve become a beast far too complicated for metaphors and poetry. So, let me be a little more clear. Let me risk being wrong like I always do.

Dear Violet,

When I explained that I couldn’t stop comparing every man’s heart and mind to yours, couldn’t love something that paled in comparison to you, I was asked what I would say if you told me wanted me. If you told me I could hold your heart and mind again, despite everything. I didn’t even hesitate to answer.

I’m tired of trying to find the right combination of metaphors and moments, songs and sonnets, leading questions and meaningful pauses, just to tell you I want you back without all the bullshit. I want to purify the beasts from our bones and try writing a whole new story.

Dear Violet,

When the boy told me he worked at a flower shop, my eyes faded to sepia as I played back the nights I’d come visit you, watch you stroll between the petals and leaves, feeling the sounds of the flora. We would close our eyes and dance to music only we could hear, the sunflowers shaking to the rhythm, the scent of you stronger and sweeter than roses.

When I snap back to the flower shop boy, he tells me with a certain fascination that he can never tell what I’m thinking. I’ve hidden every vision of you behind steel mazes, the walls scrawled with your poetry, wolves in every corridor, spiders on every crevice, a puzzle that serves as a locked door and a royal altar.

Violet, this flower shop boy has eyes just as green and bright as yours. When I got in his car, he played our favorite song, the one we used to sing at 2 am when no one else was around. He doesn’t realize the shoes he’s trying to slip into, your sharp teeth around his ankles, he doesn’t understand why I think flower shops are dangerous, Violet, I took him home anyway, I let his hands explore the map of my body, finding places you helped name, my teeth sunk into his neck, leaving marks that would look gorgeous on your skin, Violet, he tasted like expired roses that were too proud to admit what they had become. He tasted nothing like you.

The next night, he showed up where I was dancing, his eyes glazed over in whiskey. I ordered my favorite cocktail, to prepare myself, to match his empty affection, but it was too thick and caught in my throat, it told me to be sober for this, forced me to feel everything. He swung me around the floor recklessly, breathlessly, choking on the sweet venom still trapped in my airway, his veins were syrupy with liquor, he was shamelessly ablaze the way we always hoped to be, but his fire sucked the remaining oxygen out of my lungs, his hands sent short circuit sparks down my spine, I couldn’t run, this is what the movies say love should feel like, but

Violet,

I missed the sea salt spray of your calm oceans.

I missed the way I used melt into your poetry.

I missed the fluidity of our dancing, hands, hips, hearts, perfectly in sync.

Dear Violet,