Fire

I can’t pretend that I am not having these thoughts,

that my anxiety isn’t bothering me.

That these feelings aren’t swallowing me because they are.

I am feeling and inviting all of these things in.

Along with you.

You came and smoke trailed along behind you.

Fire erupted from the barely there embers and here I am–

losing my mind.

I mask it well enough, but it’s there.

Images and memories play and rewind then replay on an endless loop.

Then scenarios I daydream up form and then dissipate.

I know it can’t be. I know it’s not happening, it’s not going to happen.

I hold onto it all the same.

I breathe it in and contain it; digest it.

Oh, I want it to be. I want it to be mine.

I want it for my own, but I know better.

I release it bit by bit every day now. Slowly regaining me.

Every now and then, the ashes of what was blow across my mind.

I smell the smoke, and close my eyes, remembering.

But I leave the remnants of those images and acts where they lay.

Little by little everyday.