Reciprocity?

When she doesn’t say I love you back.

I hold you tightly as I always do I whisper goodnight and I love you.

You don’t say I love you back

I wake you and help you start your day

And as you leave I say I love you.

You don’t say I love you back

I ask you when your day is through how it was. You tell me about it and I listen .

You tell me of people who want to take advantage and use you for their own benefit. You question why people don’t like you. I say I don’t know. I just know I love you. You don’t say I love you back.

You loving me is too much pressure on you.

But my loving you is a relief for me. It’s a strain lifted from my shoulders because I got you no matter what.

And I know that as long as I love you I got you.

Just because you stopped saying it doesn’t mean you’ve stopped loving me.

But if you have . So be it.

I have to stop saying I love you because I feel left alone in that moment. Where my words flutter away never accepted waiting at the door of your heart lay a million times these three words. Like gifts only partly unwrapped. You see what’s inside and open no further.

Stranded in a desert of 1 emotion.

Dehydrated and fatigued. Your words like a mirage that plagues my soul with glimmers of hope. But the approach is dreaded. The snares of your gaze the sharpness of your tongue cutting deep the silence and tranquility of my passion that burns loudly. I can not say these words with out meaning them. So I shall not say them at all for they do not deserve to leave my lips, nor travel through the atmosphere that separates my lips from your ear. And my ears do not deserve to suffer the silence of waiting for reciprocity.

You silently drive a wedge between your mind and your heart. And this is your right.

It’s an amazing feat. To escape the prison of the heart. A strength and courage I do not yet possess. But I cannot be broken. I can only love you. Though I may have to do so without words or action. My thoughts will always hold these words securely . My heart will always know them to be true. I love you.

If I ever say these words again to you it will be in response for when you say them to me. I can only hold you in my dreams now because at least there you are mine and you love me. At least there in my dreams you are mine and you love me. So must I live in my dreams for happiness to continue. Until my dreams lose their truths and cast me aside as a burden.

The stars will one day lose their shine and the night will be black with but 1 moon turning away into the shadows leaving me scrambling in darkness. Surrounded by my long dead spoken words of admiration that hold no meaning to anyone including myself as they will not help me find my way out. So I will walk alone in this darkness fueled by anger and sadness surrounded by the quietest of noise polluted by distaste and resentment that drowns out all other sounds of happiness.

You don’t say I love you back.

So this is where you must live .

You must rest in your own piece of mind.

And rely on the words you cherish most.

The ones that you never speak are the ones that are secret and your secrets are yours to keep.

But know that I’ve said it and I promise that those three words are forever.

I die I die I die after every breath I take

And my soul is fading. Consumed by nothing because of empty silences and deep sighs because of blank stares and hidden cries. Hands shaking a feverish growl in my belly hungry for a meal that will never come a starving beast of a man malnourished of compassion building a mountain of stone tears to drown under.