The Bits of the Universe
The hazel dictionaries of your eyes
I know why people want to belong to their lovers so deeply they feel like they could melt into their bodies by just laying in a pool of their flesh, skin, bones, teeth. I know why people want to eat their lovers, drink their blood. I know why they want to feel that incurable, unexplainable gravitation pull toward them like they can’t ever be close enough. Laying in bed beside you, I asked you if you could hold me and you said, “Of course” and not a mere two seconds later I felt your arm around my shoulders, warm and pulsing, strong like tree branches yet soft like grass.
I know why people want to belong so badly it hurts them. It’s the only way to possess another person. I now know why people fight, scream, torture their lovers. I now know why I could just sit on my bed and let my legs dangle off the surface as you said goodbye, why I watched your car drive down the freeway and how I cried most of the way home. On the subway coming home at 12:30 AM, the speaker says Castle Frank Station and I get off, walk limply down Parliament Street and think about how much I’ve grown. I can feel maturity pulling me down like a grave. I remember your hand on the doorknob as you left my room. I can remember, with only a twinge of sadness, the hazel dictionaries of your eyes. Every word, every definition, was found pooling gently to the bottom.
I now know why people want to eat their lovers, drink their blood like vampires. It’s the only way to belong to someone. Nobody gets what she desires. I wanted you so badly my skin peeled off like a sunburn. I get off the subway and the definition of missing someone is finding your face in the face of every person who is not you. I’m telling you, I know why some people eat their lovers like cannibals, starved monsters, delicate with grief, so mournful they can’t even weep. I promise you, I know why some people want to be their lovers. It’s the only way to turn into someone else. No one gets what he desires. You are the sun but you burned my skin until it turned into ash. All I’m left with are the bits of the universe that aren’t good enough for me to align with.
