A New Home

If you're interested, I'm still writing, just with a new voice. Find me here:

http://whatsonyourheart-speak.blogspot.com/

Breaking

I've been living without accountability. I can be the mess that I am and never improve, and that's how I like it. I'm supposed to want to be better, I know that...but I don't. I want to stay here, miserable, and not be bothered. I don't know how to be happy, and all I wanted was a way to avoid thinking about that fact. If I could simply rush fast enough, find enough distractions, find other people who make a life out of being a mess to throw myself in to, I could avoid the way things actually are.

A situation I cannot fix.

Here's the part where I say I am going to change.

I'm not.

I know myself well enough to know I'll keep doing it this way, my point is is that this blog is no longer useful to me. I no longer need a place to be sad, in fact I find sadness bothersome. It's no longer tragically beautiful.

So though Jude is a giant chunk of me, Jude is done here.

Hermit

I'm going away to be by myself. I'm tired of all of you. You walk around with your words and your pride and you just make me sick. You're so careless. So loveless.

I'm going away to feel the shape of myself again. I tend to lose sight of who I am in my efforts to find a place among you. What was it he taught me? There is no place for me. Not one of you will understand me, much less want me.

I'm going away to be myself again. The only place I feel like me is...Alone. I'll curl up inside myself and go back to sleep. I'll lie. I'll hide. I'll stop trying.

It's so much better this way.

Desperate

The shape of your full lips, and the sweet perfection.

It should have been enough.

I should have been lit.

Someone tell me why I can't feel.

A Thing Seldom Found II

You were in my dreams again last night.

I wonder...do you enjoy haunting me like you do?

I haven't thought of you in weeks, and then there you are, popping up inside my head. Against my will. I'm sure I imagine our memories better than they really were. I know that. And so I put them away, somewhere inside myself, and I leave them untouched. Until you....you come back and kick up the leaves. Make me ache for you.

This is madness. We've haven't spoke in years...our time together lasted the blink of an eye. And yet...my dreams...you're always in the ones I remember. And after each one I just want to run to you, just to speak to you.

If you could have been the one to undo all this wrong...how could you walk away?

I wish I could just forget you as much as you seem to have forgotten me.

You Smelled Like a Mix of Curve and My Own Personal American Dream

Sometimes I sit very still, close my eyes gently, and remember the scent of you. It's usually after I bump into someone wearing your cologne. The smell is close enough to bring you to mind, but lacks those tones specific to you, I strain my mind trying to remember them. That scent that was so unmistakably you is so vague, the memory flits on the outskirts of my mind, always trying to allude me. See my mind knows better than to let the other self remember you. What would be the point in allowing that false comfort? Sure, sometimes it's nice to go back, to remember those times before I had lost the single most precious thing in the world.

Because we were more than this. We were better. Better than the best and brightest dreams they sell in universities. Better than cars and tvs and dvd collections and limitless mp3s, better than the best fine cuisine. Better than even the strongest friendships. Better than any success one could hope to find.

Better than anything life has to offer.

And now I am without you, and must always be confronted by the knowledge that neither today, nor tomorrow, will there be anything better than us.

When I met you I lost my taste for anything else.

What do I do now? Knowing nothing...will ever be right again? And I will never again have a place I belong?

What do I do now that nothing matters?

I guess I can sit silently, looking as though I am merely day dreaming, and try, try so hard to remember what life was before my heart was shattered.

A Thing Seldom Found

I put my itunes on shuffle mode the other day and one of the Foo Fighters songs you loved came through my speakers. Of course I thought of you...and I just had to ask you...what were we?

To me...you were the brightest, and shortest moment of happiness in my life. I always hoped that we would come back together. You had your life to live, and I had mine, but I always hoped that in all the madness, somehow it would end up you and me.

I don't have a whole lot of faith in things like that, and then I never knew if you were serious about me...And I just need to know, so I can put this to rest, once and for all...how did you feel? Did you want me like I wanted you?

Was it more than just some short lived fling?

Do you think of me still?

Do you ever think that the single greatest tragedy is that we let each other go?

I remember our late night talks...continually being blown away by how right it felt to be with you. I thought you felt the same.

Maybe I was just wrong...If I was it can't hurt me now, but I need to know.

Maybe there was never a need for my sad and lonely days. Maybe...the hope I found in your eyes still exists. That's something to smile about, right?

Maybe you're happy with someone else, and so the past doesn't matter. Then again...maybe not.

I'm brave enough to find out.

Fever Dreams

I'm not asleep, but not awake either. My mind is in a haze, and I start to see the all too familiar scene. It's my greatest fear of what could happen with you. We sit together in a group of friends...as the conversation goes on, I grow more and more silent, the darkness blooming inside me. Slowly the friends trickle out, and it's just us sitting there, as is so often the case. It's one tear, and then one more, and by the time you notice I am crying so hard I can't hear. I can't see. It envelops me so much that I can only slightly feel your hand resting on my shoulder.

I think you might be asking me what's wrong. I don't know. I have no idea. I just feel the enormity of this thing whenever you're sitting there with me.

There is no one else to give this darkness to. No other home for my despair.

I cry and cry and cry and cannot give you a reason for it.

You help me home, and then days go by without a word from you.

What now?

I snap up off the couch, I shake my head and tell myself, no...that won't ever, ever happen.

Mothers

You'll never understand how much your love feels like hate. Or the weight I bear around my neck that is the words you use to try and tell me how important I am. It just sounds like a list of demands, and a checklist for all the things I never was and cannot ever be.

Release me. Please, please, please, just let me go. Hate me. Forget me. Whatever it takes, just please let me go.

I've been fighting for my life with you for so long. It isn't even something you love, or like, or have any fondness for at all.

But it's all I have, so let it be mine.

The Way it Didn't Happen

Your lips turned blue, but you wouldn't take the blanket. Your hands trembled, your whole body shook. You were too distracted to care. I couldn't convince you to calm down and tell me what was so wrong. Your eyes looked blank. You simply stood in my door way and stared at the floor. Your clothes were dripping and I worried you would be sick if I couldn't convince you to make some forward motion. It wasn't like you to come over without the intention of kissing me.

Finally I took your hand and gently pulled, my voice trembling as I begged you please. Finally you looked in my direction, without every really looking at me, and came forward. I wrapped you in a blanket and gently touched your face, searching for some sign of what was wrong. I sat you on the bed, and went to find dry clothes. When I came back you sat your head in your hands, silently sobbing. I ran my fingers through your hair, and when you looked up I handed you some clothes you had left behind the last time you spent the night. Still unable to meet my gaze, you nodded and took them from me. I sat on the bed and watched you shiver as you changed. Your pain cut through me, I gestured for you to come lie down next to me. As you came I could see you were starting to come out of your distraction. With your head in my lap, and my hand in your hair I finally asked you what was wrong. A deep uneasy breath left you. You said very very quietly that your grandfather had died, and he was the only one to ever believe in you. As I hugged you, and kissed every inch of skin I could reach I told you you were wrong. That no matter what I would always believe in you. I held you as you cried yourself to sleep.

Vault

You hold my secrets safe. You know the stories that make up my soul. You've heard them all, and tacked the words upon your heart. You hold me close. You see in the patterns of my skin the story of why I grow silent on car rides, and from the scars on my left thumb you glean the details of the best year of my life.

You know me. You treasure me. You stand between me and the rest of the world.

I'd love you, if I had you.

You're my favorite dream, and if I knew the way, I'd make you real. Pull you right from my imagination into my arms. The boy with the tragic eyes and strong arms. A large heart, and a slow smile.

A smile just for me.

Kate

I don't know why my thoughts have turned to you, as they sometimes do.

All you taught me is that good things are always a lie.

Fool me once, that was him, fool me twice, that was you.

I must be such a comfortable place for a liar.

I see your smile in my mind, and the lovely life you've been handed. Why do you pretend? Why do you live as though you need an alternative truth to console you? Maybe that's why I hung around...to try and understand why when nothing was wrong, you seemed so hollow. You stole little pieces of everyone around you and made up a person you thought everyone could like. Who were you really? I guess I just wanted to know...I thought I did, but over and over you proved me wrong.

Lie after lie I forgave you. Some habits are hard to shake I guess.

I've never been so proud of me as the day I finally walked away for good.

The Threat

In the silent curls of confusions and limitless questions, I see two eyes staring at me. They implore me to be interesting, to think, to move, to be. I silently stare back as if to say "no." My mind is crowded and clouded, and I haven't the time, or a place in my blackened heart for your expectations, needs, wants, or demands. Take not one, but several steps back, get your feet on the ground, and let me breathe.

I'm not here to save you.

I'm not even here to like you.

"Guilty is a choice, and a chore," and it will not be mine.

I'm having the time of my life being fake through and through, and you will not make me feel. You will not make me real. You tempt me with thoughts of gentle touches, sweet words, and the luxurious rest of rightness. Your presences tells me I can breathe easy.

You lie, you lie, you lie.

I'll be waiting for the sweetness of air to touch my lungs, and it will never come. You'll leave me choking and alone.


No. Not again. Never again.

Pause

"So...I was just wondering...were you going to take the day off from work on our anniversary?"

"I don't know...I don't think I can take any days off. What I have to do in my life doesn't matter. What they want me to do there is all that matters."

Pause.

Tomorrow comes. I'm making dinner thinking about those words, trying to find some better way of interpreting them, and a ceramic dishes slips from my hands. I'm still thinking about it as I miss a tiny fragment of dish. I finally stop thinking about it when said tiny fragment ends up in my foot and I'm in incredible pain considering how tiny the piece actually was.

There's blood on the kitchen floor. At least the fish came out amazing.

Staring at my plate I ask you what exactly you meant by that.

The typical answer. It's just a busy time. It won't be like this forever. It's what I have to do to keep my job.

Sure. I'll swallow that. It's exactly what I've come to expect from you.

It's still nice to dream that maybe someday you wouldn't ever say something so careless, and if you did...you'd know what a real apology sounds like and give me one.

Maybe I'm just too sensitive.

Either way...does it really matter? It always comes down to the fact that reality tells me, you're the best of what's around.

Resume.

Say Hi to Your Mom

"Next to walls that jut from the earth
like frozen trajectories of superheroes,
we nibble and jest about things that drain and the taste of lust.
And she is over here
and I am over there
and the unlucky dark cloud is in the middle.
We like to time ourselves,
we like to watch ourselves,
and her winks cut through me like a Ginsu:
my sweet sweet heartkiller,
my sweet sweet heartkiller,
my sweet sweet heartkiller,
my sweet sweet heartkiller.

And everything's good
and everything's fine
and everything's bitter like sweet things should be,
when I'm sinking my teeth into her"

Stuck in my head. What is with my obsession with biting lately? The tickle as their teeth drag along my skin, before finally taking hold, and then the gentle pinch. It's been going around and around in my head all day.

That's all. No soul-crushing depression today.

What can I say...I have good days sometimes.

Reflecting

I've been reading over my old posts, and realized...I've never explained what exactly happened to me *after* my heart was broken. Well, I never explain anything exactly, I merely give the shape of a feeling.

A new friend (rabbit) made me realize how important that particular part of the story might be.

It was...the darkest time in my life, and darker so because before it all had been so bright. He was a white hot light, and I could handle his heat. But slowly the flame began to blue, and then yellow, orange, and then there were just the black, mucky ash left. Since then everything has been a shade of gray...though now and then, my grays have some blue in them.

Needless to say, I don't like remembering those days, but I am starting to think that maybe sharing it could be therapeutic.

In a way, I should have seen the disaster that has swallowed my life coming. Everyone around me seemed to think I should have anyway. That's how I know none of them have ever been in love...but that's another topic for another day. The point is, there was no one to go to, no one to talk to, no one who didn't think it was my own fault. Including me. I didn't think I had a right to grieve. I was cut open, hallowed out inside, and I simply closed myself up, and continued life devoid of feeling. I was so sad, but I wouldn't let myself be. Every time I wanted to cry I swallowed the lump in my throat and said no. I pretended to keep being the person I was even though I was entirely altered. I was friends with all the same people with no real affection for them. I could no longer talk to people. All I wanted to say was how much I was hurting, but I wouldn't allow myself the release. I had it coming. I should have known. I had no right to be sad.

I lost every part of myself. My writing. My heart. My love. Myself.

I had every right to be sad. I had every right to cry and cry and cry. I had every right to call on every one of my friends, and be that pain in the ass complaining about their broken heart. But no one said that to me. No one made me face it. No one even noticed I was shutting down, and breaking off. No one noticed the panic attacks I began having. The first was in a movie theater. All of the sudden I couldn't breathe, and a sudden wave a realization hit me of how alone I was, and what an impossible endeavor it was to go back to having nothing. I just thought "I can't do this. I can't do this." My two friends sitting on either side of me noticed nothing. There was no one who knew me. No one except him, and he didn't want me.

None of that matters though, not really. Because what I discovered once I finally fessed up to myself that I was still hurting 7 years later, is that I do not have it in me to recover from what happened. There is no getting better for me. There is just acceptance.

And the chance to not do what was done to me.


Oh...and that tiny bit of hope I can't seem to kill that maybe, just maybe...I might find someone who gets me again. Even if we're not in love...even if they can't protect me from my host of personal demons, to be understood again...to feel at home again. It would mean so much. It would even more to again find my heart...to take a breath and not have my chest feel tight.

It's been so long.

What You Don't Notice

You don't notice how when I know I am going to see you I get so excited that I can't sit still. I often clean the house 3 or 4 times before you even get home just because I can't contain the elation.

And every time you walk in the door and notice nothing I deflate.

Maybe I didn't do it well enough, maybe you have something else on your mind, but you always seem to have something else on your mind, am I ever on your mind? Am I ever your focus?

You're always mine.

Are we working, am I making you happy, should I leave you so you can find someone who really does make you happy?

Would you be happier if I just stopped trying?

Sigh.

Over and over again I have to remind myself not to think that you should notice the things that make me, me. You should not be endeared by my small things. You should not notice, or love my quirks. I have to be happy just to have someone around. I'm past looking for rightness and understanding. You're a warm body to sleep next to, and that is far, far better than I ever thought possible.

So why can't I stop wishing you'd see me?

I just want to stop wanting.

Dear Rabbit

I hear you. I don't think you're a creep.

I've been where you are. I've felt what you're feeling. I've read your words, and I know. I even left a few comments telling you as much, but they don't seem to be showing up on your blog, not sure why.

In any case...I know how alone you feel, and that it will get worse. If you need a friend, someone to listen, someone to take your mind off things, email me.

lostcause.jude@yahoo.com

You may be flawed. You may be to blame for things. But there is beauty in you, and things will be better. The good in you will see to that.

Maybe Because it's Late...

I'm acutely aware of how hopeless every single thing is.

"Everyone is a let down, it just depends on how far down they can go."

And that includes me.

Learned Behaviors

At night I find my favorite pair of sweat pants, and the comfiest sweatshirt I own. I need these friends of my skin because I know what every night brings.

The cold.
The tremors.
The sheer panic.

You can see it if you watch me sleep...I'm fighting an enemy you can't see. I thrash and whimper. I cry and scream. And by morning it's as though I never slept at all.

It always starts the same. I get into bed and wrap around myself pretending you're holding me. I think of who you might be, try to see your face. Sometimes this happy day dream keeps the fight away, but most of the time the sadness finds me and tries to take you away, and make me remember everything I need you to protect me from. I lose my grip on your phantom and must prepare for battle.

I can't talk about it with anyone. I can't say to anyone "well the reason I'm so tired all the time is because I won't ever be able to sleep until he finds me and keeps me safe from the dreams."

It's a learned behavior...keeping your sadness to yourself. But not here. Here I can say it's been so long since my last post because sometimes the misery swallows me up and takes away my words. It convinces me that there is no reason to keep writing, to keep trying, to keep holding on to my sanity.

But I wouldn't have to try so hard...or keep anything to myself if I could find you. I'd like to believe I will. Jude does, so part of me does.

And so I ask, as I ask every day....Where are you?

My Letters to You

Dear You,

What's wrong with me? It's been almost a decade since there was an "us," and I still find your memory strung around my neck, weighting me down. I can't move on. This is my life now, remembering you. I don't miss you. I don't want you, or even to go back and live those days again.

I just remember you.

And pretend. That may be the worst part. I pretend to love someone else. It didn't start that way, I thought that in time your hold on my heart would loosen, I'd start to feel again. And maybe I would have if I'd chosen better. Instead with every kiss, every touch, I am reminded how alone I am. I used to treat your every expression as a treasure, and you reciprocated. No one else seems to speak the language. He doesn't notice my despair, he can't feel the falseness of my affection, nor does he notice when my soul takes flight for a brief moment. I think it's because he is in a constant state of neutrality. He appears to feel nothing, and his motivations come from places foreign to me. We don't understand each other, and it simply pokes the bruised surface of my desolated heart.

I know you're asking why I stay. I know it because I ask myself the same thing in those all too frequent moments of weakness. I stay because I know what you taught me. That that thing I am looking for, that I thought I found in you, isn't real, and should I find it, it will be a life destroying lie that I need to run, and run fast from. I stay because I know that this is safe, and it is the best I can hope to find. It is love, as imperfect as it is, it is love. And the only thing to keep me from completely detaching from humanity.

Maybe it's foolish, but I continue to hope in spite of you. I hope I can find the indescribable. I hope I can fall in love again, and that when it happens I'll have some way to know that it isn't a lie...that I'll have some way to trust it.

So don't go ruining that too. Asshole.