Learn
A Poetic Decision
Learn to live without her love
Come to understand that just because
You are head over heels in love with her
She does not owe you her heart
The wondering of where she is
of why she loves the one she loves
of how they spend the gaps of their days together
Put these things
down
The wandering gaze tracing the lines
of clear, delicate collar bones
of drifting fabric on willowy frame
of long, nimble fingers
Look away
There is nothing to grieve
She had never been yours to behold
Nor yours to pursue
If you must mourn
Mourn the end of
Harbouring such a hope
of pouring your love and heart
and all your complacent dreams
into this broken cistern
And who knows?
Perhaps she does know that you see her only in parts
As she has allowed you to
Only on the surface, as some kind of muse
That she plays, not out of insincerity,
but out of self-preservation
And though knowing, perhaps she pretends she does not
And chats and laughs with you, as she does with everyone else
Who speaks to her in starts, with stars glimmering in their eyes.
It is all she can afford
It is all you can afford
But you have reached this point
of deciding to learn
Not to let these things matter to you anymore
Let them not bother your mind
Nor distract your heart
Let not every rise and slumber revolve around her
Let not every before-during-after conversation with her
Cripple you into paralytic inaction and self-flagellation
You overthinker and overdreamer
Just enjoy how you both brush past each other sometimes at all in this life
Nothing more, nothing less
To do what needs to be done,
to create beauty together
Brief, individual moments
that stand and flare and fade
Learn to be content with what you have
With who she has allowed you to be in her life
Leave the rest of it behind
And let her be
