Friday, January 19, 2024

I SEE YOU


I see you.

No one else may, but I do.

I know you’ve been up nights, pacing, or lying there counting breaths.

I see you wondering if that cough is a sign, 

Taking your temperature just to be appeased.

I see you running to the arms of a stranger despite the risks

Because the one you love is being smart, safe

but you need a hug, a fuck, to be held.

Rendering that professed love void.

I see you suffering, as we all are.

I see you hiding that suffering as we all do.

I see you posting inspirational quotes instead of

Emoting the truth

I see you white knuckling as the carriage takes you

Closer and closer, up up up to the pinnacle 

After which, on the plummet, you can scream with permission

Scream with terror under the guise 

of a roller coaster ride

I see you seeing your friends sick and dying

Questioning the horror of dying an unlived, unseen, uncelebrated life

I see you.

I see you trying to pivot 

Bound up in the effort to be normal

You are not normal

You are not loved

Enough

You are in a place where you can never be loved 

Enough

To let the seeing ones in. 

To let someone, see you

I see you

Every day sporadically

Slip into a puddle of grief and sorriw

Tears

Sobbing

Randomly










4:52

It's 4:52 on a glum New York Sunday
When you've just got back home and your socks are still wet
Sun sets on Manhattan, the sky is still gloomy
rain ticks on the sill with the clock, a duet