Love Poem 38

Most of the time

I want to be alone,

and not everyone understands that.

Not everyone understands that while

I want to be loved,

there are terms and conditions

for how I want to be loved

and they sometimes present as

space and distance,

time and separation,

and none of it makes a great deal of sense,

not even to me.

I thought love was about wanting to be with someone.

I thought love was about standing on the tip of a sinking ship

with someone and watching everything fade to black.

I understand a little bit better now

that love comes in a million ways

and even my own ways make sense to someone.

While being alone can

yield nearly every fruit I seek and

it can bear nearly any burden I give it,

and the solitude allows me to

be full

and

to be me,

it doesn’t allow everything.

Being alone doesn’t save me from swallowing myself whole.

Being alone works until I am confronted by something

of which I am afraid.

I don’t always know how love looks

when I have spent so many years

burning bridges,

poisoning wells,

and cutting ties,

and maybe I never will.

I hope I will figure it out somehow.

What I worry about the most is to be alone,

face to face with the void,

and to be asked:

is this alone enough for you?