Originally posted to requiempathic at livejournal; 11-11-07.

—

Just so you know? I care. I care. Maybe more than I should.

This isn’t jealousy. It’s a slower, older sort of burning feeling. Right down to the roots.

I like this place, this cluster, this cave, even though it’s not a secret anymore and the tree-canopy filled over that gap to the sky—the one the wind used to pass over back when we thought we heard monsters scream? And the door, of course, that’s gone. There’s no mystery left.

But plants grow here and that’s the thing. Of all the places on all the islands, sunlight and sea, you still find some in the shade. They twist in ringlets over our old, scrawled words.

When I saw it, I wondered why there were shooting stars between your smiles.

Star-crossed? Lovers?

Stars don’t have fruit stems.

I love you two—not like fireflies and roses and poetry, no. Those lines are all yours. It’s a feeling like waking up and running to the beach; having a place. It’s a feeling that makes old photographs seem like just days ago.

Sometimes I act like there was no in-between. I pretend like I don’t feel black-violet running in me.

Sometimes I run the old circuit, even when there’s nothing left to win. The wood went all brown-green, gone. Dead.

But you have to understand why I scratched over that part of the rock.

I had to keep pretending.

I didn’t know what else to do.