Unfinished

She said she wanted to help me,
but the only thing I could think of
was to find a time and place
to shut out the people in our lives
and sort through our details.
We started writing our story
many years ago
but we left it unfinished.
She said to just leave things be
and move forward being friends.

But this doesn't help me.

It still leaves me tormented,
looking for answers
that could close all the chapters.
This could've been a great story
if we had known what we were feeling
and had the guts to keep going.
But real life has pushed us to a point
where happily ever after
is just wishful thinking.
Maybe now she can help me
finish writing our story of
going from what was
to what is.

First Date

I realized after burning
a triple digit hole in my wallet
that all I need to know about her
is that she only likes
to sing silly little pop songs.
I can do the same things,
but rhetoric starts to run thin
when the music stops.
I don't want to
jump up and down mindlessly
to rhythms that don't inspire.
Give me something with a
slower and sophisticated tempo,
something that makes two people
draw closer and sway as one
and in the end,
it's probably a hell of a lot cheaper
to do as well.

Complex

Maybe I've read too many stories
about complex men and
how they try to live their lives.
They carry a knowledge that
life and love and sex
have to be taken on a dare.
And they dare
despite the possibility
being disappointed in the end.
But where I reside,
one can't live like that.
The surroundings just wouldn't understand.
Too many people already have
chiseled away their complexities
so they can fit neatly
into square pegs.
Anything else is looked at
with suspicsion and scorn.
That's where I reside,
a place of conformity,
a place where "compelling"
is manufactured into an hour long TV drama.
"Compelling" and "intriguing" can instead
scare the bejesus out of people
when witnessed up close.
So maybe in my quest to keep
complexity in my life,
to keep the many sides of me
active and living,
I may have to walk alone,
to live and love and make love,
as a dare to the prospects
of maybe being
disappointed in the end.