Paradise Lost

Paradise Lost

Words I’ve never read

not in its entirety.

But I can’t see it or think of it

and not have you come dancing into view.

Without meaning to, I think of your smile

then your smirk

then the time I hit you,

and suddenly I’m not sorry you and I forked in the road,

you going your way, me going mine.

 

I think of gardens,

and there you are again,

rising up like a daisy,

calling me a columbine growing

out of a rock,

making the unattractive beautiful

just by being me and being

resilient—

your favorite flower, just the same.

I think of the peppermint phlox

that I loved but didn’t survive

the harsh August when water was necessary

and I was absent.

So it died,

and I left it in its pot, thinking maybe

it would come back,

maybe it would live again—

like I kept thinking about our relationship.

And neither one ever happened.

Flatlined, that’s what we did—

You, me, and the peppermint phlox.

Paradise seems like something

that happened to us.

Maybe that one day when we knew

if the world stopped,

left us alone,

we would be perfect.

But days don’t stop, not even when we beg

or laugh or cry;

and you and I only locked every other week;

the days in between were muddy,

tainted, like sugar in your veins,

Tired, like lying in the grass and wishing

for a try again,

knowing we had already lost.