once more with feeling

Where you and I collide

Almost but never quite

Decades will be spent

On trying to touch

When a look was all we got

When longing was all we had

But you and I

We're eternal

We come back each time we die

We leave but never say goodbye

We jump and run and trip

But we're always fading

And I'm always falling

With you, towards you

Always, for you

But there is no ground

And I can't be found

All this air and we're breathless

All this land and we're homeless

All these people with their loneliness

All this space but no place for us

All these drugs—still no cure for us

Thank you for finding me

Thank you for seeing through me

Thank you for choosing me

Thank you for staying

Thank you for being you

Thank you for allowing me to be my true self

Thank you for caring

Thank you for fighting for us

Thank you for not leaving

Thank you for accepting my flaws

Thank you for never giving up on me

Thank you for loving me and hating me and teaching me and growing with me

Thank you for choosing me every day

1. where you're confronted by their absence, their death - literal or metaphorical continues to haunt your every waking moment. because you're used to seeing them everyday, existing in their orbit. and now gravity won't quite feel the same. somedays you won't remember as soon as you wake up, somedays you won't see the point in waking up anymore

2. the one where it doesn't feel real enough, the one you keep waiting for to hit you because it's been a long time since you were in their presence, so you forget. you forget their absence isn't just an absence anymore, it's a loss. and you cannot just wait until you meet again because they're not in the same physical realm anymore. it will hit you and you will keep forgetting until you don't

But every time you text me and I am dead tired and just a bit lonely, I still find my fingers reaching back to you.

Making concessions for you does not make me feel better about myself.

'If equal love cannot be, let the more loving one be me' - the first time I read that, 'bullshit' I thought. The second time I agreed.

Now I know it's little comfort. It does not help much to know you love them more than they love you.

Or maybe it's not about the measure of love at all. But it's certainly something like - 'I'll make you laugh when you're feeling down even when I have no jokes. I'll keep you warm even when I'm cold. I'll let you go even when it hurts to do so.'

It hurts to realise I drop everything for you and you drop me for everything.

It hurts even more that you don't realise it.

Because I smile, smile, smile when I'm in your orbit.

I am all the planets and all the meteors and all the asteroids and you are the only sun.

There is nowhere to go but to you.

There's nothing to feel but joy.

Time will go on and people will move on and you will go away but I will stay.

And so does the ache.

But I wished you were.

I looked up to you because

In a world where I felt so different,

So lonely,

So out of place,

You made me feel like I belonged.

Like I wasn't alone.

I haven't been a kid for years now

And I understand you more than I thought I could.

But you still look perfect to me

Or as close to perfect as one could be.

Only now it hits me like an epiphany

You could be as perfect as I could want

But perfect is not something

I want to want to be

•I’m proud of you

•You are so smart

•Thankyou for telling me. It must’ve been hard.

•Hey! Nice shoes!

•Your hairstyle looks cute

•I love you

•Thankyou for taking care of me

•You’re so amazing

•You slay!

Do not try to keep my pace

I am not deserving of this gentleness

I am not worthy of this embrace”

Not anymore

Not yet"