Could Have Been....

 It was the best of times, the worst of times

A thing of nightmares or some fever dream
The bravest, most atrocious my hopes had been
As unworthy your own regrets may deem
For reasons unknown, you were my best could have been....

A hand that held me when I expected it to drop
Keeping note of my allergies at the tea shop
Something strong must have been in the air
to feel so at home at a bus stop
When chairs were broken to avoid my sight
And showing up everyday was an endless fight
How do I deny the courage your bones held
to walk and be known as someone by my side
On nights that were sharp on my wrist
And lips stained with the horrors they kissed
How did you paint my storms a rainbow
so full of wonder, they could even be missed
Before bruises and scars thickened my skin
The simplest chaos I was centered in
Twin or not, you lit a flame in me
and it was my warmest could have been.

My tears so cold, washed the warmth away
The expired good memories taken off the display
Blaming myself was easier than wondering
as you left all my rainbows tired and grey
Same road, same songs, both sides of the earphones with me
Same walls with fading pictures of you to see
I played my cries on repeat so loud,
lost track of that once beloved glee
All my dementors catching up to me soon
Couldn't bother running away over your rune
Lost your bliss I shielded myself with,
a fool to think I'd grown immune
Burning puffs I never thought I'd inhale
Aimlessly walking to revise our trail
I relived our memories alone so frequent,
overwriting until I blurred every detail
My insecurities gave me the wildest grin
As all you were now was a could have been....


Fleeting time, complex new troubles strangeled
Carried our windchime to every window until it got too tangled
The book with your name and the book I named you off
Kept them like a child I alone then fathered
From birthdays then a secret date unforgotten
Formal wishes to hear the sound and lighten the burden
How many seasons must pass to not shed a tear
going from heartbreak to meeting casually in person?
I hated you so long as I was easy to fool
Loved you until it felt too cruel
I remembered you better than I did my old self
but couldn't forget you despite it being the golden rule
My past is a ghost, I see you a Casper
In a desert of hurt, the least painful pasture
I move on unhurting, unblaming, unhating myself
uncaring for you, the only skill I can't seem to master
Painful yet beautiful, like a heroic scar
A nature known to man yet so bizarre
Like a first draft I can neither erase nor publish
a cherished life I secretly watch from afar

For once I was tight enough to suffocate
And all of my efforts were up for debate
Too close, I'll either shoo you or hurt myself
stand there, refrain to knock, a door so delicate
And today you ask, hiding behind a drink
If you are the last person of whom I'd think
If a line about you is too much to ask for
when I've washed novels about us down the sink
Its too late now to end or begin
A sharp story on papers always so thin
We could write all the poems we want
But it would only be titled "Could have been"....