If you hated me you could have killed me
smote
me dead
threw the lightning bolt that cut me off at
the knees.
But that would have been too easy.
The time that the car narrowly missed me as
I
crossed the street,
the time that she pushed me down the stairs
but
I stood up, dusted myself off and carried
on—
you know it could have gone differently.
When I contemplated the costs of living as
they ranked against
the costs of death,
you could have tipped the scales,
pointed the way home.
Instead I shivered, walked past the knives,
and lived to be stabbed a thousand more
times.
I am supposed to believe in the superiority
of breathing as I
stand here
gasping.
I am made to believe that all will be
understood as you
speak to me
in
pig Latin.
I could embrace what hysterical preachers
teach,
denounce those who make me question my
faith.
Instead I am too aware of their pain and
their fear.
It could have gone another way.
I could have been allowed even this flawed
and thorny
path out of
here.
In my dream he held my hand as I wondered
what he
was doing there,
entirely too happy and still unable to see.
You take even my midnight comfort away from
me.
I seem resolved here, you know, although
for what has
not been made clear.
Every hope, every sneaking suspicion, every
wild and
grand fantasy I watched disappear like
helium balloons in
the pale and infinite sky.
I wanted to hold on but was cut loose,
left broken but still living on the
ground.
It was not to be.
It was not to be.
