Haunted Heart

As I was looking for a poem for today, I came across a piece in my journal. I never throw anything out because I often feel that a line, a word, something can be salvaged at some point for another project. Usually it’s just a word or a phrase or some observation that I want to write on. Often, I never return to it. There are times five years later where I will somehow remember, “Oh, I think I have the perfect word or ending to go here,’ and that phrase or word find it’s home in a poem. There are also times when I start free-writing, and I pretty much write a poem, except something strikes me as it not being done, so it sits stationary like many of the words or phrases. These pieces get revisited more often because they’re more noticeable than just a phrase, but many of them just sit waiting to come to fruition. I was looking at a piece for today, and it just wasn’t asserting that it wanted to be what I put up today. Then, I found one of these blocks that was untitled and sitting there. I don’t know why today it spoke to me, but it did. There was something in the simplicity of it that I liked this morning. There are days when I love poems that are complex and mix a lot of senses. There are days when I also just love very simple poems. I think like a good pop song, sometimes simple poems get a bad rap. They are direct. They say exactly what we feel and leave little mystery. It’s like a pop song. There are days when you just had a breakup or you’re at the gym and you want something that just says straight up, sometimes with cliches (which I’ve never hidden that I sort of crush on sometimes) what you really feel or felt. When I read it, this was one of my poems. There are very few songs, movies, shows, poems, where breakups of relationships are celebrated. Unfortunately and fortunately, in my life, many of my relationships ended not in a space of spite and malice but in a space of ‘we helped each other grow and, in the process, we outgrew one another. We changed each other, that allowed us to become better and stronger individuals; however, relationships are about ‘helping one another be challenged and grow,’ and if that’s not happening, it’s usually not a healthy space to be in. There’s a lot of people that would say, ‘If it’s not totally broken, don’t leave it.’ To me, that’s a fear based reaction. I have relationships that never stop growing in my life and always bring out something new and we’re often challenging each other in a positive way. I’ve walked away from some of my greatest loves because ‘we did our work together.’ Often, that was agreed upon. There were times when that was hard to see, in the beginning for one person, but, in time, the realization came, ‘you had to set me free.’ As I was watching Schitt’s Creek the other night (spoiler alert if you haven’t watched the last season), I found myself in tears by the beautiful seen done by Alexis (Annie Murphy) and Ted (Dustin Mulligan) where they acted out an amazing scene written by the writers of the show, where they can’t allow each other to stay in the relationship because it would be so hindering to their own personal journeys; however, they celebrated how much they loved one another and admitted, without the other, they would not have grown into the people they became. There’s a handful of songs that write about breakups in this way or celebrate the beauty in acknowledging the heartache of letting someone go who you love because you know staying together is going to lead you off the course of the individual journey you are on. We tend to think of break-ups as ‘tragic,’ and ‘someone did something,’ and that’s not always the case. They are sometimes just ‘growth.’ Cliches and all, in this little piece today, I felt that. It might not be the best thing I’ve ever written, but I love the spirit of it. Someday maybe it’ll expand or maybe it’ll stay as it is, written as a piece in a journal, that was maybe too raw at the time to be reflective and creative. I think it celebrates the idea that we can love people forever, who we had to let go because we were no longer on the same path. When we truly love, I believe, we change people. The reason that love stays in our hearts is because that person gave us something so incredible, love, and the one thing, I believe, we’re all on this planet to do, which is to learn and grow. The piece had no title originally. I felt like I needed one for the sake of posting. I guess it could be called ‘Untitled,’ but in the name of the upcoming Halloween holiday, I decided to, for now, call it “Haunted Heart.’

Haunted Heart

There will never be a ghost that quiet breaks away from it’s endless night
to be with me the way you did after we whispered our final goodbyes.

There will never be another dance song that just the two of us can hear out loud
that nobody else really hears.

There will never be that confidence in me that shies away
because it’s scared of the shade that could block it’s way- that only you could make.

My lines never run so cold,
as when I have to tell someone our love ran out, when, in my throat I taste the pain of indistinguishable doubt asking
Will I ever be able to love anyone else like I did you?

There won’t be tears that trickle down my face, so hot, so disgraced,
just a lot of places, where we went, reminding me of how I miss you.

There will never be an escape so complicated
as the one where you held all the maps to my heart.

I will wear sweaters for quite some time
to hide all the scars and goosebumps you still provide,
A mixture nobody would see or understand beside us.

I will sleep in encased sheets
and be afraid to touch my dreams for quite some time.

The world will always ask why someone walks away from a love that you will miss,
and I will never fully be able to explain the simple answer,

except maybe,
we both grew too much and couldn’t fit into our couple’s jeans

There were a lot of adventures to be had
that I never wanted you to have to shove into your pockets,

So instead of me, I gave you space. FYI,
along with that space comes a room in my heart,
that you’re welcome to stay
if you ever just need a place.