Deep down I knew you did not care.
I lied, I hoped, I bargained, I persisted.
And so, I got caught deep in the snare,
The cords around me tightly twisted.

I explained away the wounding words,
Just anxiety, circumstance, clumsiness.
Meant for each other, a pair of nerds…
I would not believe you thought of me less.

I was a toy first, but a nuisance next.
You dismantled my self-worth,
Slinging derision by trebuchet-text.
But now I say, after a long and difficult birth:
​
I quit this game.

Under these bright, unfamiliar skies,
My forsaken night is your lonely sunrise,
I stare at your image and fail to let go.
I will anchor the memories in my head,
For the rainy days, in this sunlit land, ahead.
Thank you for teaching me much I had to know.

Strong and beautiful an entity you are,
Bearing without complaint many a scar,
Yet from you, only gentleness would flow.
I miss your tender touch at moon’s rise,
And wonder; what were the limits of these highs,
Since as days passed my bliss did only grow…

In that most precious of currencies; time,
We were but paupers, with nary a dime,
And I know: my ambition has made it so.
I don’t apologize; it would not hold true,
You know this was the path I had to pursue,
To this continent of lead, strife, and hope go.
​
Yet, I gently rage against the threads of chance,
That let our paths cross in time’s vast expanse,
When the arrow was knocked and taut the bow.
As the sun burns this land and boils its sea,
While across the skies, the rains fall, think of me,
And hope we both find serenity’s glow.

​When will I finally let you go,
How do you firmly grip me so?
Few things bring as much joy,
Daydreaming of you is the only toy,
I never get bored of and ditch.
The synthesized feelings are so rich,
That you should receive class A control,
Lest you bewitch society, as a whole.
I knew reconnection was risky, and hence,
When I saw you after long absence,
Walking out of the underground,
With headphones blasting sound,
Worrying about local warming;
How your freezers were performing,
With your black dress, red lips,
And pink flowers in your grip,
There was merely resignation:
“I’m still fairly fucked.”
[…]
I’m in a cocoon of illusory strands,
Cerebral spinnerets did this deed,
Weaving which needed no hands,
I’m powerless to stop the feed,
And via those phantom-fangs,
All traces of dopamine siphoned,
To be retrieved only through paths
Where I’m beholding you enlightened.
[…]
Nonetheless, for this I had prepared,
These events were in part calculated,
And I hope I am not so bad at maths,
And since after months of disconnection,
We finally re-established a rapport,
Now I might indeed find succour,
In the know that we part amicable,
And when I leave this sodden land,
Consigning to the past most therein,
To one wracked by wind and flame,
Riven by war within and without,
Yet where the seeds of future flourish,
The image of you I carry thither,
Imperfect recreation, locked in my circuitry,
During myriad conversations we’ll never have,
Will smile at me more oft than not,
And one day, if our paths again intertwine,
I can anticipate a glad reunion.

There are things I could not add in that farewell note.
But perhaps by setting them down, I can make them
Leave my head and flow into this binary code instead.
Maybe if I organize my feelings this way,
Codify, define, label and box this day,
Understanding and release can follow.
For a time, I felt I was getting closer to you,
Sharing intimate moments in relaxation,
Your willingness to engage with something,
That is so important to me, humouring me,
Even though this was all alien to you,
That was incredibly endearing, I admit.
But as lockdown passed, so did we get
Ever more distant, even while spending
More and more cumulative time together.
Surely, that must have been a sign,
That we had reached a global maximum,
And that there was nothing more in store
In any future I could attempt to foresee.
This endeavour was perhaps doomed from the start,
Too great and frustrating differences in ethos,
Too different a temperament and mentality.
And this unseen deadline looming nearer,
Which while unknown to me, was something
That you must have been very cognizant of.
What part that played if indeed any,
Or if you never even considered that,
Which has been swirling in my head,
I cannot and will probably never tell.
Maybe I just externalized my loneliness,
And assumed you were motivated,
By similar basic drives that I am,
Even though your priorities evidently
Seem to be arranged in a different pattern.
Your surprise that anyone could
Prioritize family over profession,
Was ample evidence to this effect.
And you are a hard person to read,
Keeping your inner thoughts and emotions
Ever clutched close to your chest.
Perhaps in the end my dithering,
My inability to firmly make up my mind,
As to what exactly I wanted and why,
Was ultimately a blessing of sorts,
As to firmly pursue this line of inquiry,
Would it seem, only have led to more pain.

Which of us is left behind?
Am I drifting out of your world,
Or are you slipping out of mine?
It has come to a farewell dear,
May it be the final one!
Was it a waste of all those years,
Or was it worth the learning?
I don’t think I’ll ever forget you.
You'll always be a little scar,
Somewhere deep, scarcely felt,
But aching, just a little bit.
We both have to move on,
We both have our lives to live.
So, let's do just that. Farewell.
The devil takes the hindmost,
And believe me dearest,
I will run as fast as I can...

​And now the oscillation of life versus
Quasi-life is entering a trough again.
Was only a matter of time of course,
But the stochasticity led to
A perception of suddenness non the less.
This heightened sense of existence
Was intriguing if rather distracting…
Suppose it is time for mundanity,
The cycle of work and procrastination.
At times I can fit some creation in as well,
But that’s more exception than rule.
Not that I don’t enjoy quasi-life,
It certainly has its charms…
But on experiencing a glimpse of the other,
It does become rather grey and shallow.
Maybe it follows that I should curse
This experience, I should curse life.
Curse life for the contrast it gave,
For the tantalizing vista I glimpsed.
But that is impractical self-indulgence.
For if ever we had a purpose, it was to live.
And cursing your very existence
Leads to a path I’m unwilling to follow.
So ever onwards and upwards.
And as the memory of life fades,
So will the other start to seem
More and more colourful.
I know that it is not really colour
Seeping back, bit by bit, into quasi-life,
Rather my eyes slowly forgetting
What colour is supposed to look like.
The result is the same.

​Without you to give me purpose
Self-gratification rules my mind.
I had you to make me strive
To be what I knew I ought to be,
But now that I hide from you,
All motivation fades away.
I wanted to make you proud,
But I know that you will not
Pat my back anytime soon.
And this too goes to show;
I need to break free from you
In more than one intricate way.
You are innocent of captivating me,
But I need your virtual counterpart
That I have imaged in my brain
To loosen the strings
That make my action potentials
Dance to your tune only.

​You left me to rot in this dry eternity,
Cloud nine turned to ashes long ago.
Why did life go haywire?
When did happiness crumble?
Not a hint of a happy mirage,
Not a whiff of a drunken daze,
Sobriety looms on the horizon,
As far as the eye can see.
And there is nothing I can’t see.
Orthogonal sunlight assails the land,
As sand meets sky and sky meets sand.
The desert takes me into its desolation,
And I submerge in its vast river of dust.
I walk the straight path to nowhere,
I follow the endless dusk,
And wait for time to end.

I have been rejected, turned down.
I made myself into such a clown.
Like an obstinate mule, I still love you.
And so I wonder: what should I do?
As I lie contemplating in my bed,
Thoughts of you chase each other in my head.
Imagined scenarios never to be,
They are the daydreams I see.
​
Why? Why do I deceive myself so?
In the future I must learn to say no,
To forgive and eventually forget,
While trying hard to avoid regret.
To protect myself I’ll have to move on,
As soon as the shock and pain are gone.
I will flee this self-built prison of hope!
It may be that the lock already broke.

​A gutted fish thrown onto the shore,
Drowning in slow motion,
Liquefied air, ice on fire,
The sun submerged in water,
Its light locked up in a coffin,
A meteor falling away from the surface
To crash into a flying submarine,
An alien suffocating on oxygen,
Here on the Third,
An autistic child singing on stage,
A dreaming insomniac foretelling the past,
An illiterate poet rewriting destiny,
A lethal overdose saving our immortal souls,
An antimatter elephant
On a rampage in a china shop,
Deaf Mozart and blind Delacroix;
Lady Liberty in handcuffs again,
Hope left drying on a meat-hook,
Butchered by common sense,
Feelings left cooling in the refrigerator,
I’m numb, and it’s killing me.