A Night in January
Slipping away into the void
Not dark, really,
But more empty, resigned.
To finally get out of your delusions and confront reality,
To make terms with your own and other's choices of what it is -
Is surely the hardest feeling there is,
Don’t you think?
It is hard and, to make things worse,
Not at all rare.
On a late winter night in January
Snowflakes freckle the beautiful night, floating down slowly.
You stare from behind a delicate veil of glass
And occasionally, through the half-opened window,
There comes drifting in a soft cold breeze,
A breeze that brings a shiver down your spine.
You feel a certain warmth where your heart must be,
And you are delighted to find
That despite everything,
In this divine moment in the timeline,
You are content.
You wouldn't give away this magical moment
For anything else in the world!
In this moment, everything’s beautiful,
And you're grateful.
As you tip your head backwards a little
And rest it on the wooden frame of the coffee shop,
Letting the warmth from the homely fireplace
Light up your shut eyelids,
You let out a sigh,
A small smile resting on your lips.
But strangely, as you live on, stretching this moment,
This moment of perfect peace and serenity,
The small huff of sigh seems to drag on, tugging at something else.
A strange feeling, something you can’t place.
The back of your eyes burn, and your throat constricts.
Tears! Two little droplets trickle down the side of your nose.
Are these tears of joy? But why then why do I feel like wailing!
You open your eyes, and your sight settles on the scene in front of you.
On the other side of the coffee shop, away from your dim corner,
Sit a bunch of excited young people huddled close, chirping.
You watch them, refocusing your vision,
As the heavy winter air is sliced
In sudden moments of low, fast whispers, and collective snorts.
You stare at them absently for a while.
Your eyebrows furrow.
I don't envy them, I'm far from lonely.
I've got plenty of people I can call friends!
An amazing family, good friends, I have everything.
Why then do I feel as if they have something that I don't?
You wonder, are people just pretending?
Does having a fun and good little social life
All come down to pretending that they care?
Even when it feels like they don’t, even when it all feels like a lie?
I don't know about you, but those around me are
Amazing, for sure, and a real inspiration,
But one act is all it takes
For all of it to evaporate, in a second.
They don't even look back,
Never do they try to reconcile what is ruined.
Makes me think, if they even considered it worth protecting in the first place.
Had it always been me,
Me who tried to stick along and hope
That despite the emptiness in my own heart,
I do make you feel loved?
Was it me who tried to keep it going and hope
That despite all evidence to the contrary,
You might, just might eventually see me
As a friend worth keeping, a friendship worth protecting?
But come on, of course I'm overreacting!
Who am I to expect
That others be careful with my heart -
Why should they, what do they owe me!
Nothing.
They don't even know you, and they have others whom they care about
A lot, lot more than you.
Sure, it was me who tried, all this time.
...But only in my eyes, it seems.
Because now, it looks like you were also holding on
To a string long gone taut.
And you were only looking for one reason,
The one incident to back away
And spare both yourself and me
The trouble
Of pretending.
And then it happens, the shift -
Maybe from your end or maybe mine,
But neither of us ever makes an attempt
To reconcile.
Because it can no longer go back to what it was, right?
I know you now.
I cannot care as much as I did earlier,
And so neither can I expect the same from you.
It’s much too difficult to address it and put it through.
You see, I simply can't accuse.
I don't even consider it your fault, no not at all,
Because I understand! (Even though I wish I didn't)
I can come up with so many reasons myself
For why you did what you did,
You don’t even need to utter a single word in your defense.
I will defend your case, and defend you well,
And as the judge, I declare you free of guilt.
I will spare you the trouble of facing it,
Don't I owe you at least this much?
The discussion ends before it even starts,
All in my mind, in the void,
The space between my ears.
It’s different now between us,
And it’s much, much easier to remain silent.
The silence that rings across the hall
Like when glass breaks upon contact with the marble floor.
Eventually, the ringing stops,
And we can both go on pretending
That nothing ever happened.
So is it just the pretentiousness that keeps it going?
Because without it, every relation is only for once,
Never repairable, never amendable,
Never do you get a second chance.
A candle waiting to melt out, expend its lifetime.
Beauty, with a touch of malice.
And with that knowledge, I am bound to try as much as I can
To feel the heat of the precious, fleeting candlelight
With intent and a foreboding sorrow
Because with every tick of the clock,
I know that the wax is melting,
And there seems to be nothing that I can ever do
To slow it down, reverse it, or stop it.
The girl who had once shared cupcakes with you,
Now an outsider, unknown, as if we’d never met.
The boy who once shared his deepest secrets with you,
Now a nameless, unsaved contact on your phone.
The list of names goes on - it’s endless, infinite.
Humans who come without a reason
And leave just as fast, without an explanation,
Without a final goodbye.
Oh, everything that could have been!
If only... if only what?
If only I was someone else and not me?
Your eyes unglaze, focusing once again
On the group of youngsters, now getting up to leave.
Footsteps shuffle, the door swings open, ringing the bell,
The sound cutting harshly through the night.
Their voices trail off, and the night settles back into a silence.
You take the last sip of your hot chocolate,
Savouring it, before putting down the mug with a soft thud.
Well, perhaps it is pretention, for everybody.
After all, much lies beneath the surface,
Unseen to one's distant gaze. Who am I to know?
Or... or maybe it isn’t all so pathetic, and I just have loads left to learn!