Poetry: Too Much

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I used to wait for your bright blue ticks
like a widow waits for war.
I stared at that little screen
and pleaded for something more.
I knew the hour you usually came.
I knew the shape of your delay.
I could turn your silence into scripture,
making religion out of the way
you just didn't say my name.
I used to leave the door unlocked,
but my heart lit up the room
each time you wandered in and out of me
whenever you fancied cumming home.
Now your... messages live in a folder
with a lock - a thumbprint for a key.
I don't read them.
I don't need them.
If you want me, you can come find me.
You called me "too much"
because I loved you too loudly, proudly,
too honestly, too badly,
even platonically - still, too much to leave politely.
You stood there with your hands up.
"Don't put that on me!" you cried,
as though you hadn't struck the match
and watched me burn inside,
as though my desire was my ultimate crime
and your part in that offence denied.
I taught myself to be less reachable.
I learned the art of disappearing.
I remembered that sometimes silence
isn't sadness.
It's clearing.
Then, every time I wanted you,
I wanted you a little less,
until the ache became an echo,
and the echo, and the echo, became emptiness.
Another man now comments.
It's just a heart beneath my name.
Suddenly, you reappear.
You're as predictable as winter's rain.
You come creeping through my brambles
with your old, familiar flame,
although not because you finally love me.
No. Only because someone else
has noticed I could be worth the chase.
Oh, I know you don't really want me.
You want possession without the claim.
You want to know that if you whistle,
I'll come running back to you again.
You want your little kingdom,
with no one else inside - just me -
but you don't want the responsibility
of standing by my side.
Isn't that the funniest part, though?
I don't even hate you right now.
I think what's frightened you:
I don't need your permission to leave.
You taught me that I was too much,
so I became too much to lose:
too loved, too intelligent, too visible,
and too busy choosing who I choose.
I used to wait for your bright blue ticks.
Now I let them glow inside the dark.
I stared at that little screen,
but now they wait behind their lock,
where I keep them akin to a mark
of a girl who once believed
that being wanted meant being chosen.
She's gone.
The woman that I am closed that door.
Now, if you want that game again,
darling,
you'll have to find someone
who still wants to play it some more.