25 October 2018 -The Storm Chasing SANKOFA
I don't understand why we're all so young and afraid of getting hurt.
Like fuck that fam, we're resilient, we'll heal.
I have no doubt about it- because I've survived so much more than I thought I possible.
You see to me, a young heartbreak is an irresistible temptation.
Almost as tempting as kissing your lips when you lie next to me,
at night,
smelling of cheap cigarettes and booze.
During the afternoon, when the sun floods my room the way your presence floods into the essence of my being- with no remorse.
During the times we've chosen not to tell anyone about,
because "we're just friends".
I'm not about this thing of loving people with half my heart through -which is why being your friend feels like torture.
You see, I can't love anyone with half my heart,
take the whole danm thing and break it.
Please, I beg this much of you,
because I can handle it,
I can handle so much more than you give me credit for.
I can handle the curve of your naked back
and I know this, not because you've given me the chance to do so,
but because I can handle you when you're fully clothed yelling at me.
And its like you yell louder with each fight because there's an undercurrent in your voice I've come to recognize as fear,
because I've begun to get too close
and even though you seem strong you're probably more fragile than the bottle of gin that chills on your desk that you emptied a week ago during our last fight.
And it's like you yell louder with each fight because you can't understand why I haven't left yet and in truth, I can't understand it either.
I can't articulate it properly but I have a feeling it has to do with the way that you begged me not to leave once,
begged me to stay at 3AM.
Begged me in the most raw way-
I think it was birthed then, my desire not to leave.
See my friend,
I've come to understand your silence more than your words
because you are so fucking choosy when it comes to your words,
and so calculated in your actions,
that your silence speaks to me the loudest.
Your yelling doesn't scare me anymore and neither does your silence.
You were silent that night after our last fight you know,
once you'd calmed down and collapsed into the bed next to me.
You were silent as you pulled me closer,
silent when you choked back tears that night that you thought I didn't see.
I can handle it,
I can handle you
the bird sang to the hurricane.
You see, your silence speaks to me right?
and in your silence you've already left fingerprints on my heart,
so why leave my body untouched?
So I won't be silent around you like I normally am, hear me now babe- take my heart and break it,
break it without fear,
because I don't expect you not to.
What I do expect is for you to understand the fact that I can handle heartbreak
because I'm volunteering myself for the renewal which will come in your wake.
I anticipate you littering your love on the landscape of my heart.
I anticipate the death of our love at your hands,
because I was dead to the idea of loving again before you,
I closed my eyes when I noticed that you'd resurrected empires in the darkest parts of me.
I closed my eyes when you started to breathe life into my brokenness.
I closed my eyes when you started to plant flowers in the rough terrain left by those before you.
I closed my eyes to all your love because you speak to me in ways that I don't quite understand
and have satisfied me in ways I didn't know I craved.
And I crave you in your absence,
not the flesh that you've withheld from me- not for a second.
No,
rather your naked spirit.
Snippets of which you've revealed in moments that you're too drunk to remember.
I crave the love that you're too scared to show me.
Show me your scars
and I'll show you the gruesome ones I've gotten from people I've long since forgotten.
Show me your nature
the winter howled to the heart of summer.
Because you see my love I can't live in fear,
I can't live for the "if only"'s
because they will devour me in a way far more vicious than your love ever could.
So come my love,
come before the Summer ends.
Come teach me a new language of love that only you and I will understand.
Come teach me a new dialect that will die with you and I alone.
Come teach me your ways...
the light whispered to the darkness.
Do me this one favour, destroy me for my art.
Be the hurricane that we both know you are.
And in return, I'll do you a favour,
I'll be a wildfire,
I'll be a tornado,
I'll be a tsunami,
I'll be a natural disaster,
And my love will speak to you in a way that only you could understand.