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Break-through
So, you’re leaving then?
After all these years.
The highs, the lows, and the in-betweens.
You’re off.
No, of course I’m not ‘ok.’
What?
I should have seen this coming?
If I were a man– I’d understand?
That’s rich!
Coming from you.
You know, I wish I were.
Then maybe you’d think twice
about holding me down
and accusing me
of overreacting.
Years of support, dressing-nice, diets,
arguments and forgiveness – for what?
To recreate that brief moment, ages ago
(or so it seems)
when you wanted me?
Well of course I’m angry!
You’re leaving.
You – leaving. Ha!
The irony.
If you only knew how many times
I’d thought of walking out that door
to escape you, your selfishness
and your ‘security’.
You bore me.
True, you have ambition, but in all the wrong ways.
You’re happy to drone on
and on at that tiny desk job
until one day all the sweat and tears
and loneliness land you a promotion,
doing the same thing
with a different title.
You don’t yearn for the outdoors,
for mystery– you’re scared.
You’d rather sit with a book and learn
second-hand what you could be living.
Me?
I’m not that small-minded.
I’m a big-town girl, a player, a ‘whore’.
Call a spade a spade, or not, if you’d prefer.
The world doesn’t allow me ‘little’ things.
It denies me the easy life of fast promotions,
equal pay and a safety at work -
not that you would know.
But it’s made me dream bigger,
push back against the pressure that
closes in from all sides
and just do.
Run wild through the street
and scream and laugh and kiss and screw.
Go swimming at midnight and slither across
the full moon, reflected in a still lake.
Befriend strangers in exotic lands, and
bridge the gap that lies between our heart
and souls.
And wouldn’t you? If you were me?
To claim back some of the life
they stole
when I was born?
But still... it hurts.
I’ll miss you, I suppose,
Like a crinkle in the carpet, or the corner of the rug.
Your familiar smell or the way you suck in air
through your teeth when something’s bothering you.
It won’t be me anymore.
And that’s ok.
Your world was already getting
too crowded
for the both of us.
