I don't know who I am anymore. I'm not sure I ever knew. Maybe that's why you found me; you recognised someone who was malleable, squishy and shapeless. I didn't know what I was doing. I had no plan, no goals, no dreams or aims. Why would I? I felt like nothing, so I dreamt of nothing.

You found me. You said I was worth something. You built me up, said I was your man, said everything was alright with the world when I held you close. So I held you close and believed that I was worth something, that living meant something. I promised to protect you. I worshipped at your altar and called you my goddess, promising my love undying. You smiled. You drank it in and took it as your due.

The first time I told you no, you changed. You became a goddess of fury, of darkness and lightning. You tore me down, shredded my soul, had me begging for forgiveness for daring to defy you. You held me close as I apologised, stroking my face. You spoke honeyed words to affirm my place in your life as your man.

I don't know who I am anymore, but I know who you are. You are a succubus, a vampire, a goddess of dark delights. I started out as nothing, and I became even less. I cannot exist without you. You play with me, because it pleases you. One day you will tired of me and I will disappear.  After you, there is only you.

 

Brevity Quest 2018: entry #3, word count 258.

Before you, there was me. No longer looking for love, on my way to becoming an architect instead of a struggling artist and sometime poet. Tired of dating, I went back to college, taking comparative religion, urban planning and design, astronomy, feeling out of place as a single mother.


Before you, there was me. Barely speaking with my father due to choices on my part that in hindsight were dreadful. Ironically, as Chairman and full professor of Math and Computer Science, his philosophy with students was fail, make mistakes, try crazy solutions. He refused to pass football players just so they could play. He didn't preach the same at home. Nothing less than 100%.


Before you, there was me. With one daughter, not planning more children, let alone marriages, dreaming of designing a glass building. Cleaning an existing small river to flow through under glass bridges. Allowing birds, butterflies, frogs, fish, turtles, moss and native wildflowers to be within and without. I wanted the sun, moon and stars inseparable.


Before you, there was me. Laughing and living, being with people but feeling lonely. Alone, liking my own company although no family, friends or lovers understood. I had no telephone, used a wringer washer, hanging laundry outside. Various cats came and went but never more than four at once. I was wild but responsible or so I believed.


Before you, there was me. Thirty years later, I regret not thanking you for loving me, my daughter, healing the rift with my father, giving me two incredible sons I love beyond measure, for the times we walked in Nature, the night long talking after making love. We made this house a home and like my desire to have the sun, moon and stars inseparable, you and me will always be.


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