A Sad Lover's Tale

There is but one story in my life
For which I have no words.
The telling is not so difficult,
But to hear it as it stands,
And from my own lips,
My very tongue the puppeteer –
How can words form without the beating of my heart?

The beginning is not so sad.
A young man and a woman,
Seeking solace on their own,
Tossed about in fate's chaotic winds
Find one another.

"The feelings I have for you
Are forever," his song plays on in her mind,
First told as a word of reassurance:
We will last, they said,
I will hold you,
And we will last.

And it is at this very moment in my sad tale
That my hands begin to shake
And my breaths are harder to take
As my heart begins to race
And I am paralyzed
From the mind down.

Because they did not last.

Never before one another
Had either of them known
What it was to love
Or how one was to be loved.
And the lesson was not easily learned
Nor was it easily taught,
And, besides,
They had no teacher.

And so their love began to fade
Into the background of their lives:
Messy, angry, ugly, confused, and cold.
And so she began to yell
And scream, and cry, and beg
For the comfort of his touch,
For the warmth of his kiss,
For the assurance of his love.

And he could not find the words to say,
"I love you still,"
I'll hold you still
I want you still –
I need you, still.I always will.

Or, maybe he did say it
But she could not hear it
And she could not feel it,And she could not see it
(even though she wanted to – still)
And he did not know what to do
Or how to make her see.
And, besides,
She was yelling too loudly to hear him anyway.

Now with clammy palms
And shaking fingers,
With a shivering spine
And a racing mind,
I writer, I am still,
And this ending, these words,
This story, I will find.

Tornadic,
And with the violence of Pompeii
And Katrina's sneaking, sudden horror
The two fate-tossed, star-crossed, completely lost
Forever victimized, had-each-other-so-hypnotized
Lovers' dance of destruction
Was difficult to watch.

And as the emerald city they had built
Did crumble to the grown beneath their feet,
He looked at her
She looked at him
And neither one of them
Could feel complete.

And that, my friends, is not the end
Although, perhaps, it should have been.

In months to come,
They tried and failed
And cried and yelled
And knew a darkness they had never felt.

And then one night she heard a knock upon her door,
With trembling hands
(scared always now
that she's alone)
The turning of the knob revealed to her
A broken shadow of a man,
A crumpled soul,
A darker version of her once shining Knight,
With head bowed, his barely audible words
Begged entrance.

Standing aside as lover came in,
She suddenly knew a truth that hurt so bad
She could not speak.
He said his bit:
Confessed his love,
Reached out for her,
Kneeled at her feet,
Begged for her grace . . .
And watched her,
As silent tears rolled down her cheeks,
Her eyes averted
Her head was bowed
Her shoulders shook
Into his eyes, she could not look.

As suddenly as he began,
His speech did find its end
His silence, now
A question hanging in the air –
Love me still?
Hold me still?
Want me still?
Need me still!
I thought you said you always will?

Woeful eyes, still full of tears
His lover's eyes,
His cherished eyes,
Raised, finally, to his

"I do not want to love you anymore."

And, like a knife run through his soul
Her words destroyed his everything
No anger left,
No tears to cry,
Words failed them both, one final time.
And to the door, he walked again
She rose, heart pulled to his with painful force,
His hand did fly into her hair,
Once a source of comfort there,
Her head he pulled into his chest –
Remember this, she thought inside
His scent, his hand, his heart, his breath
Upon my cheek,
One final time.
It was with silent tears all down her cheeks
That he last saw her face.

And this is where the story ends,
With silent tears all down my cheeks.