Im on'ce

There are days when I remember the delicate closeness of just existing alongside you.
The curve of your porcelain lips and the curl in your golden hair.
The tenderness with which I’d reach for you, and the timidness of my touch.
You were like a flower petal I dared not disturb with my clumsiness—
and yet I always wanted to keep you crushed up against my chest,
secured in a well-stitched pocket,
held so tightly that you’d feel my heart beating.
A rhythm that you might get used to,
walk in step to—
one that, across any distance, would call to you.
An inaudible hum;
a resonance only you were attuned to.

I still feel my fear of inadequacy,
how I knew I’d let us down,
and had no way to divert this inevitability.
The desperation I felt with each moment that passed us by—
moments I couldn’t keep snapped in a picture book, framed on a shelf,
or go back to and redo.
Some stupid gesture I made, or statement that slipped out.
I loved you more than the air I breathed,
more than the sun and the moon and every goddamned tree.
I was so naive to what it all could mean,
and so fucking lost in your beauty.

The books you read and the drawings you did,
the music you introduced me to, and the movies of the walking dead—
I wanted to remember each event down to the most minuscule detail.
To torture myself with the facts I’d distort:
how stupid I’d sounded, and how brilliant your every thought.
You were my first love.
With you, I experienced feelings I’d never even dreamed of.
Food tasted better, days lasted longer.
The cold air and hot summer wind were constant reminders I was alive in a world you existed in.

I could never seem to forget my unworthiness.
I could never seem to escape your every glance,
the way you observed the objects around us.
I wanted inside your head, to know every one of your thoughts.
I was obsessed with you—
with the way you understood, with the criticisms you had.
I desired to know every crevice of your skin, to memorize its scent.
I wanted nothing more in life but for you to need me in the same way a flower needs its bed.

You gave me life.
You gave me sight.
You were both mystery and romance,
breaking each assumption I held
and proving I was wrong about every clue foreshadowing the next step.
Being with you gave me more confidence about everything,
while simultaneously making me more scared than I’d ever been.
I’d never tried my hand, never felt my grip so tightly on the cards—
unwilling to play foolishly, not wanting to call or bluff.
I was stuck at the table, all in,
and I hadn’t a certainty in the world but the love for you I carried within.
Flushed, famished, floundering.

I still remember the joys we experienced and the suffering in each step,
the desires we both had and how they didn’t just disappear after our relationship ended.
That somewhere, I locked away and kept hidden the treasures we created—
the tune that still could only play for you.
A youthful discovery,
but no fleeting dalliance.
Preserved between the pages of books I still read and music I still listen to,
you became a part of me in ways I never intended you to.
Proof of love in the proof of my life,
still living on in memories we shared—
grateful for having existed in a time and space that you once did.