Here I am again.
It's the middle of the night
and I'm alone
and I'm crying and
wondering
why I do this.
I have been sitting here
for hours.
You sat and watched for a while
but, understandably, got tired
trying to make space
in me
for your ideas.
I go to the bathroom
to look in the mirror
to share this with someone familiar,
and
to see
what cold and crying at 3 am
looks like.
It looks like shit.
Sunken, blotched -
these jutting breastbones
look like grating covers.
No smooth skin, hair eyes
although that wasn't
that long ago.
You are very understanding
and tolerant and
tell me that maybe
my pain
is because I've discovered that
I don't love you.
You say that intensity burns out
that
our companionship is not
ambivalence
that there is longevity in
our comfortable existence.
I like the sentiment and
I wish it were true
but in fact
I have such loveinabundance
that it drowns us both.
I have become us
and lost me.
So, in the morning,
I will dress in a suit
and fill my briefcase with
consultant smiles
and someone else's ideas
and I'll go and do the thing
and get some applause and
some money.
I will pick up my son
after work
and truly feel the love
he has no choice but
to give me.
I will pay the phone bill, the power bill.
I will worry about tax owed and
arrange for the cleaner, the plumber and
the marriage celebrant for May.
And tonight I will end up here
cold and crying
at 3 am.