"No heart, not this one."

I am sorry as I say the words,

But somehow things got absurd

And his void blocked out my sun.

Somehow I was drenched again,

Lost, confused and in vain

Wondering how I'm back in this place,

The same heartbreak with another face.

"No heart, stand tall now."

I plead as the dead weight drags me down

Along with every memory of us in this town

I need to straighten up, someone tell me how.

Tell me there's more to live for,

Many moons and palm trees waiting for me,

A lighthouse with my name just by the sea.

And that the one I can call my own won't be too far.

"No heart, don't burn out."

We've done this before, we are the phoenix

Rise in love, with love and find your fix

I saw the post-its fall from the wall. A smiled spilled out, without reason, in sadness like it does sometimes. They try too.

To hold on by virtue of their nature. To not disappoint and carry the scribbled scripts like secrets that needed reminding they existed in the first place. But now they were failing. No, falling with a taste of freedom. Giving in to gravity. Forgetting a pointless purpose that others stamped on them.

Oh my, look at the sun. It sets, it rises; both have started looking the same. So have those plastic bags stuck to logs in once-pristine waters. Those pretty wrapping papers stuffed heartlessly into the muck of actual garbage, of decay. And wires -- knotting themselves over in hope of staying unplugged, making a mess of themselves. Its not a beautiful mess anymore. Its just chaos.

Loud, unforgiving, inescapable chaos. The kind of dark shadow that lurks in the wild even if the sun is shining down brutally bright. It's always there, tinting my tiny glories. I'm beginning to believe in this stronger. I'm seeing that there's no strength in trying to be strong -- either you are, or you're not. Trying is as good as faking. Asking for this chaos to set in your moment of doubt, or second guessing, of weakness, of confusion. How do I know?

Because I paused a second too long after I tripped. And the rot set in me like the burning sun. It didn't matter if I found the cool shade right after, if I slathered sunscreen on my scorched skin. The seemingly harmless sun brought those resident shadows that did all this damage. And now it festers inside. Making me puppet with my nerves at the will of its mercy.

The Indian woman sits out on her balcony, tears streaming down her face. On cue, Peter walks out with his trusty tray of tea.

“Must you always find me crying out here?” remarked the woman as Peter performs his routine.

“Must you always put yourself on the path of pain?” retorted the butler.

The woman snorted through the tears. She adjusted herself in her seat. “Well if you must know, we have been secretly seeing each other for a while now. Of course, you know that. Seldom things pass you Peter.” The butler smirked at the compliment. The woman continues. “Somewhere along the line, it became an endless cycle of ‘I love you, I love you not.’ I became tired of it. Frankly, I am tired of it. I couldn’t handle it anymore.” The woman shivers from the invisible breeze. “So what did I do? I confronted him. I am such an idiot.”

“No you are not Madam. You needed to end the painful cycle. You did what was needed.” comforted the butler. The woman smiled. Tears are still trickling down her face.

“I wish you weren’t right. Well we had a long painful conversation. We talked about his conflicted feelings for me. Funny enough, he never had the decency to ask me of mine. Back and forth we go, arguing that we love each other and he arguing we don’t have a future together. We fought this battle and I was ready for him to defeat me. To end it once and for all. Dramatic right?” chuckled the woman. “However, at the last moment, he told me he loves me. He told me he seriously loves me. No doubts whatsoever. I have waited so long for him to finally confirm his feelings for me. I used to dream of the day he admitted his love for me. But do you know what’s the worst part?”

The butler raised his eyebrow and sipped his tea in anticipation. The woman strengthen her grip on her cup. The tears increasingly fell from her eyes as she struggle to say the next words. “I did not believe him for one moment.”