JLT

Your Gift

I accept your gift, unfair though it may seem
of sleepless nights and relentless dreams
chasing through the night to where you stand,
calmly watching me fall, not lending a hand…
Mornings are filled with disrespectful light
all at once too busy, all at once too bright
it’s glow too diffused to be unkind,
dull and lifeless like my daily grind.
Somehow time passes, days bleed into one
while each day I race only to be undone
by the dreams: the tears wet on my face
as night falls and there’s still no trace
of you. There’s no running away - naked and cold
shorn of all pretenses I now clamour for a hold
back in my old life. So I buy myself sleep
with shots of whiskey and wonder why I keep
living. For I was not ready for your perverted game
the love I treasured was to you only lust by name.
Now I imagine your face cold and cruel
Unsmiling eyes watching me grovel -
I thank you for the hurt, surely I asked for it.
I thank you for the agony, surely I deserve it.
More fool I, for despite your heartless coup,
I still – stupidly, insanely, blindly – love you.