I don't know what I'm missing, he says.
I don't know what I'm missing?
The truth is, I know exactly what I'm missing, because you are exactly the same, friend.
I am missing taking care of you before myself. Your ego, your pride, your vanity. Your wants, your interests and your thoughts. Your boredom, your sadness, your happiness it all came before mine.
I'm missing hearing the same question over and over again. Your fears spilling from you in new ways like you flipped through a pocket thesaurus. Almost as if asking me again with new keywords would change the meaning of my answers.
I am missing you projecting your past failures onto me. I am not old girlfriends. I am not bad friends from high school. I am not your father. I didn't want to leave, and I tried everything I could to not disappoint you.
I'm missing driving myself crazy, tiptoeing on eggshells, pacing back and forth, losing sleep, never being in the moment. I'm missing wondering if I had said the wrong thing, if I'd been too open, not open enough.
I'm missing what I was missing before. The guy who held my hand, and told me I was beautiful when I smiled, who said he was in love with my mind - with me. The guy who treated me like an equal, a person with feelings. I always wonder where he went.
Without you, I am missing a person to fill a space. The person you became, became a placeholder, and yet, without you standing here, I feel fuller.
With you so far out of reach, my hands were stretched too thin, love from my family and friends slipping through my fingers like sand, so I could hold on to you.
Without you, I am no longer missing myself.
I know what I am missing, I tell him, and how sad it is that you do not.
YOU ARE READING
Yellow Paint : A Collection of Midnight Thoughts
PoetryAn ever-growing manifesto of the musings that keep me up at night Vincent Van Gogh used to eat yellow paint because he thought making his insides bright would make him happy. Writing is my yellow paint.
