Ghost Street

Stop it. I love you . . . please.

Please Yussouf, Please.

Bath tub water. Blurry vision. I spy bubbles; I spy death with my little eyes. I’m dying. God help me, I’m dying.

~~~

You remind me of memories I don’t remember. You’re not as tall or as handsome. Or as witty or as emotionally charged. You don’t have the fire or the drive. You can’t speak as eloquently as he can. You don’t compare to him, but in your defense, no one does. No one can.

You remind me of memories I REFUSE to remember.

He taught me to say my please and thankyou’s. He taught me to prostrate. I sat cross-legged at his feet and he inundated me with his love. Through him i learned that pain was good, that it was imperative I wrap myself in it. He said he loved to see me cry, so I cried because I would have done anything to see him smile. And you, you with the brooding eyes and sugary sweet voice, you reignite a familiar fear in my heart.

When you raise your voice at me, it’s him that I see. That excruciatingly handsome face, blind with rage, screaming obscenities in my face. Threatening me with words that I never for a second took for granted. Common sense tells me you are a better man, but I’m too fragmented to take the chance. I pray to God you understand, Dear Souvenir.

He took me to the verges of hell and restored my soul with every dying breath. He was my savior and my lord, for him I would have walked tight ropes across the Niagara Falls. Every kiss, every touch, drove me to places with outlandish names I fail to recall. Places with good wine and old cheese.

I lived in awe of him, I hope to God you understand.

I hope you understand that you trigger a switch in me that opens the flood gates whose keys I ate. I hope you understand that I flinch when you hold me because I keep expecting him to drag me by my hair and tell me how much of a slut I am for getting with someone else. I hope you understand, but somehow I know you don’t. Because you are incapable of understanding, I continue to fortify the walls to my city. You are adorable, and charming, and refreshingly uncomplicated. You need simple, and i’m far from simple. I breathe algorithms and upper level algebra, and you can’t handle me.

I know you wish I could be more malleable, but my knees hurt.

I can’t prostrate any longer, even if I tried.

You wonder why I don’t
answer your 3 a.m. phone calls.

When you say “I miss you”,
I begin to undress myself out of habit.

— Sierra DeMulder, “Five Years After”