Separation
I feel the warmth of your body
holding me in a protective ring.
I smell the ironed cleanness of your shirt
as you pull me closer. As I cling
to you, knowing this is the moment
I’ve been putting off for years.
The moment we must pull apart
slides towards us in a trickle of tears.
You’ve stood beside me for so long,
but now, a you-shaped gap appears in my life.
Opening up as I look ahead
to a future where you are not my wife.
Irritations are morphing in my mind
into comforting reminders of our history.
Your faults seem suddenly endearing,
your silence takes on a sense of mystery.
Can I even see you as I saw you once?
I barely remember what it used to be like
when we lay together for hours,
kissing and touching all through the night.
We threw ourselves into each other
before the rotten taste of poison set in,
snaked through our marriage, got
right to the core; destroying all, as we gave in.
Somewhere inside this turbulence of emotion
remains a sliver of that initial attraction.
Even as I stand here on the brink of separation,
there’s a hint of desire; a significant fraction
of the conundrum of feelings inside me.
But I know it’s the poison attempting to get me.
And I’ve fought for too long now
to relinquish my never-desired victory.
You kiss me, softly, and your lips say it all.
The space between us expands; it’s time to start
to begin to move away in different directions.
Untangling ourselves, we step back. And we part.
2003
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