My darlings
You became little men
The day we ran from the boogeyman
You met the task as an adventure
Not yet aware that the world you knew
Crumbled while you slept
I will bring you as much magic as you can hold
To keep your hearts moored in innocence
I cannot stitch your world whole again
I promise to weave you a new tapestry
Rich in dreams
Love
Possibility
My little men
You have learned too early
How unkind the world can be
But we will meet it
Softly
Gently
Together
-gws
"Love is not enough"
This was a truth I gave you
In place of a kiss goodbye
Love is not enough to bridge
The chasm separating us
Neither is it flexible enough
To withstand the tension
It cannot rewrite our history
Erase the years of pain
It cannot alter reality
Nor save our unsalvageable marriage
The love between us is a shadow
A wraith
A remnant
Of a hope dressed up to look like love
In third-hand threadbare finery
The illusion shattered
And the real state of things exposed
-gws
I need to unlearn your touch
The sound of your breathing
Next to me in the dark
I need to unlearn a lifetime
Of everything about you
-gws
Holding hands in matching rockers
Laughing about when we were young
You reminiscing about record stores and ska shows
As I tell our grandchildren tales of magic
Spending our sunset days in loving conversations
Each other's best bestie
Strolling into the ever after that follows the happily
-gws
I exist in a liminal state
A being
And not a being
Grief ebbs and flows in king tides
Emptying me
Submerging me
Stealing away my breath
With its pressure changes
Feelings grow in question marks
Within my hollow chest
Proliferating like fungus in the fall
Inside of my being that is not a being
Emptiness overflowing with nothingness
Destruction and restoration
Warring to fill the immeasurable void
Shaped like my cremated heart
Pulsing with unfathomable aching
Testing the tolerances of
My being that is not a being
It is surreal to be and not be
To experience the reality of the question
Posed by Master Shakespeare
In rhyme and sonnet so long ago
To understand that one can be both
A being and not a being
-gws
Everyone who has ever loved you
Have put their hands up and
Taken a step back
Now they are looking at me
Wondering if now is when
I will finally do the same
-gws
The truth has lit a rage fire in my belly
Where there was guilt and pity
There is now a simple aching coal
Burning so hot it challenges the sun
-gws
I regret to inform you
That the reality you subscribe to
Is currently offline
As reality has no power switch
There is no way to reset the system
Please accept my apologies
For the extreme inconvenience
Such is the risk of sentient life
I never promised you life would be easy
-gws
I wrote you a box of postcards
I never sent
I could not set the stamp
In place
I could not address it
To that space
You weren't there anyway
You never really were
-gws
I see the grief in your eyes
As the carefully crafted reality you made
Starts to fracture into a cascade of spiderwebs
The part of me that still loves you
Wants to comfort you
Tell you that everything will be ok
But I cannot do that
This disillusionment is necessary
And being trapped inside your bell jar
Has nearly ended me
I will not forge you a new one with false hope
That I am still your refuge
Because this all must end
You must face the world
On the other side of the looking glass
The real world where the damage you have wrought
Lays exposed before you
A cold world where you are finally alone
My heart breaks because it didn't need to be this
I wanted to love you
I tried to
But you didn't know how to accept love
And you didn't know how to give love
Because you don't know how to love yourself
You don't know what healthy love feels like
I feel the grief in my heart as I watch you
Watch your world unravel
I mourn for both of us
For the future that will never be
For the past so full of pain
For the love we both deserved but
That couldn't survive your demons
I did love you
I loved you so much, so hard
I forgot how to love myself
I grieve for all we are letting go of
I grieve along side you
As my hand slips from yours
And we learn to say goodbye
-gws
Words Wishes and Wisdom 