everything i ever let go of has clawmarks on it

[anonymous]

My mind was awake long before I was this morning.
It had been up for hours, remembering, rehashing, reliving.
By the time my eyes opened, I was already exhausted.
This week marks a year to the day since I kissed her; or she me;
or we kissed—since my life was cleaved into before and after.
And I can’t stop dwelling on it. On her. On us. I can’t stop
remembering. I go to sleep thinking of her, she haunts my dreams, I
wake up with her smell on my fingertips for a brief moment until the
illusion is shattered—and then the brain, with its onslaught of
reminders, about how we broke each other’s hearts, her and I, and that
there would never be any going back…it starts reminding me of
conversations…about arguments…about the awkward pain that swelled and
then finally burst and broke at our feet and all either of us could do
was walk away from it, and drop the debate about who was more wounded;
we both were. Equally. I know—because we have always been like this,
her and I—I know that she woke up crying this morning, and I know the
weather reminds her of this time last year, how hard we fell in love,
and I know she too is wishing we hadn’t made a mess out of it the way
we did.

My heart
Crimson and wounded and bleeding from all sides
No one can see it there
No one even knows
There is no one to tell
My pain is my secret
Just as the happiness of discovery
I didn’t tell anyone
Only strangers
And now the pain
I can’t tell anyone
Only strangers
I walk among people who think they know me
I sit by them at dinner, and give them rides to school
I celebrate at their homes, and we work long days together
Side by side
And they have no idea
They would never guess
They had no idea about you
They knew not why my face was lit up for months
Why I glowed and basked in the light of our new love
Why I was suddenly so confident and smirky, why I was so me
Why I had this new depth about me, an aura of something profound
They knew not why I started to wither and tremble and go all dark and
small
Why I was preoccupied
Why I was in tears every time I hung up the phone
My secret love is now my secret pain
And now that you are gone
Now that you’ve left
(I can’t even believe those words are real sometimes—have you really
left?)
They don’t know why I am so hollow
And even if they did, they wouldn’t understand that you leaving
Means a part of me left
You took that with you
And I miss it
I was starting to love that part of me, that sensual new erotic
adventurous side
That you revealed
I don’t want anyone else to see it
It doesn’t belong to them
It was yours
It is yours
I don’t know if I even want it back
Some days I just need to be hollow, and mourn
And watch the leaves fall from the trees, and remember