Confession

We have settled so many times, you and I, for less than we deserved. Our motivation held by numb limbs instead of the future we promised to create for one another.

Our steps falter because the past won’t let go, although we don’t want any of this, because we’re done, but yesterday continues to smack us around till are worn.

I could not get back to the hours and efforts or that little piece of me that strongly believed in us, but instead I stepped off a precipice, brusquely staunch to witness your love that was toxic and timed. A whisk of you had beckoned me thusly and that is the last thing I’d ever see before I die.

I have simply fallen. I remember nights of delicious waves of untold pleasures that we shared, so fleeting. Your words mocked the old and the wise and your laugh would fill the night with flames. I remember nights we also spent prior to your dire and little pities toward a man you insulted. A man you never treasured. A man whose guilt was never mired with eternal fret. A man whose worth was never measured.

Out of the nothingness of sleep in the slow dreams of eternity there was thunder in the deep, I came because you have summoned me. I broke and forged the stars for you and shattered the heavens with a song, immortal in my love for you, for I loved you deeply. I wrote upon the shrinking skies the scarlet splendour of your name. Till the heavens cracked, darkness falling with scornful thunder on the dreams of men and men’s desires and only in empty space was goodness walking very silently. Fearing the glory of your face through the dark infinity of love, thinking eternity shall find us as one, alone above the nights, above the dust of the dead gods alone.

You had no mercy when it came to bidding farewell to my soul whose deepest fear was drowning in a well laid of kisses. You used me and made it a proclivity. You abused my efforts and I came back every time fed by lies. I rushed to fill in the gaping holes and I did not even notice the foundation was giving way. I build and rebuild and fixed what I could of our home and I was the only one fixing it whilst you watched and criticised me, and when it came down on me, you walked away.

I went through a snowstorm just to lie by your side and you wouldn’t even walk through the rain for me. You would constantly break my heart just to prove you own yours till your words were no longer yours, your voice the tone of someone else’s, and changed who you were for validation and profit. Over and over again I let you mistreat me, not because I loved you, that was a lie I told both of us to justify staying, but because I didn’t love myself enough to leave you and put me first.

Love cursed my name and I kept wondering how parts of me you used to admire were the reason you left. I kept asking myself, how does one embrace uniqueness and throw it in your face? I’m not sustaining though, yes, love is blind, but all I ever wanted of you was for you to love me the same I loved you.

All this time I had meltdowns. I am pre-programmed to cry buckets and talk incoherently in the midst of my world falling apart, but even through my moments of self-destruction, you ran and left me to face demons on my own and I know you know I don’t expect you to solve anything, but you knew your presence during my self-sabotage was all that was required. Now I am left spreading vicious love in each and every nerve of my heart, inhibiting my mind.

You carved your name on my soul which will be there forever. I am cursed with pain that won’t heal because medicine seeks only your name, your name that is engraved in my heart and plastered on the broken pieces of my mind.

I sit alone and reminisce about the days I used to believe that love should feel like a storm, passionate, raw and raging, but so many storms have come and left me more broken than before, now I look for love that feels like a night after the storm is over.

Sometimes I take a deep breath and remind myself that not everyone will break me like you did. They won’t break me down, poison my mind, and fracture my heart.

And as for you, you are the man I will warn my daughters about. I will tell them, “My loves, potential can be a dangerous drug.” Don’t fall in love with boys that have the potential to give you the love you need, and think you deserve, because potential says ‘I will be the man you need, I will grow and my love will grow with you’ and unmet potential from boys who fool you and refuse to be a man will only tear you apart.

I’ve always wondered why it was so easy for you to constantly leave, but what I should have questioned was why I wanted so badly for you to stay.

‘I hate you,’ wouldn’t quite do it.

‘I forgive you,’ isn’t quite my speed.

‘I regret meeting you,’ would be a lie.

But the best thing for me was moving on from our unrequited love, that I am sure of.

Tell us: Have you ever loved someone who didn’t feel the same? Describe the experience.