I don’t need love to be my self

You’ll always be a memory that defines me. You’ll always be a reminder, to me: in songs, in thoughts, in words that are pigmented with your perfect accent, in a scent, in memories of remembering you so intense that I remember every moment that I’ve missed you.

I watch the shape of my eyes, feel the face rest, when I look back at you.

Your voice, how you laughed the way I’ve never heard—a flirt, childlike, joy, belief—just from knowing I was listening. Your eyes, as if they weren’t a part of you. Your lips, that I didn’t need to look at because I was too obsessed with tasting them. The squint and grimace and all the smiles that made our faces hurt.

In that way, you’ll never die, and neither will our love. It was never mine, you were never… it was always ours, to me. That’s what together meant, despite our inability to find a definition.

Now we have to live separate.

It’s sad that you’ll be, we’ll be, all of that. Maybe it’s just sad on my side of the world, that my soul aches to live with you, watch you wrinkle and fade, every day. That’s the reminder I wanted… a daily freedom in knowing we were dying together. A gift: a reflection of ourselves, staring like we did. Staring into the infinite. So eternal it made me want to savor this. This life, as short as we were given.

Some days it hurts, so exquisite, that I want the world to end. Other days the pain is there, but I keep going, a reminder that I’m living.

I almost sent you a song, another and another. Music reminds me of you. I almost sent you another letter, since all my words are tainted, inspired by the thought of you.

I don’t have a song to sing to you, because I don’t have you. Without, I am only lyrics, echoed in my silence. So I have to forget the songs that make me want to call you, and I have to forget the words that make me want to write. I have to forget everything I ever wanted, cause I was ready to lose it all to watch us die.

I can’t attempt to say hello, ask about your day, say good morning. I can’t ask about your life, where have you been, what is new and exciting. I can’t ask for your address, where you are, where you plan to be, what future appears when you sleep. I can’t tell you of my achievements. I can’t share desires I have yet to fill. Secrets, I want to tell you about every dancing demon: the past, and how I will bring them into my future. I can’t visit, tell you about my parents, tell you about my boring job. I can’t invite you out to dinner.

I’ve begun to debate with my self that can’t, that I’ll delete you from my phone. Block your number quietly, without warning. Comb through every picture, erase the evidence of your existence. Lose my phone completely. Change my number. Do all the things you would do when someone can’t control their grief. But this time, as the person, who wants to call you every day, wonders if he should send a message, writes a letter destined for ashes, settles for a picture, and for the feeling, a tiny remnant of what it felt like to be your person.

And again I’ve forgotten which self I was meant to be. So I leave hints, and ask the clouds if they could whisper, deliver your secret wishes. I barter with the wind for my freedom, to be there on nights you long for me.

Until then I’ll be this person. I have to love him too.