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Someone once told me that I was the one that got away before we even started. As if the end was right there, sitting with us at the beginning. I’ve been thinking about that lately. All the people we once let into our lives. The ones that felt like they’d never leave. It amazes me, our capacity to love and lust so greatly for one another and then forget each other. Sometimes, just like that.
I once passed an ex of four years without even saying a word to them. We saw each other, we recognized each other, we felt the nostalgia pangs, and that was that.
How can we share so much and yet continue to exist as strangers? How can something feel so all-encompassing for months, years, or decades and then be a blip in a long life story? Why do we even get to know some people so deeply, only to lose them by choice, by chance, or, at worst, by death? How can something that feels so life changing in the moment be something we just move on from?
This poem examines those feelings.
Somewhere out there is someone,
who used to know you,
every hole and every chasm,
the taste of you and bitter breaks of you,
someone you let in,
someone you loved madly,
and lost just as sadly.
An ex is a strange thing,
they are still there somewhere,
living a life unaffected by your touch.
It feels as if they stop being,
when you stop being together.
As if two existed as one
and became broken glass,
a thought that only passes.
One day you’re the first text
and the last good night,
the next you are another stranger.
How can you be a whole world,
then nothing at all?
How can years disappear in a day?
How strange to hold someone
within you, to share spit,
and beds and secrets
and have only memories linger?
How odd to be naked one day
and a complete unknown the next?
To give in to and give up so much
and live in another person for a bit…
and then poof, they pass you
on the street with just a glance
a remembrance, a pang of regret.
To leave after so many I love yous.
How can you go from a man’s poetry
to a nostalgia pang?
How can you go from primal lust
to just a knowing look?
They once read you like a book,
and now they wouldn’t even
turn a page, some shut out
altogether, often for the better,
We cling so quickly to one another,
so desperate to become one,
to hold another soul in our hands,
to understand another’s pain,
to caress curves, feel deep wounds.
We cannot resist communion,
feel love almost like an ache,
desire in our blood and bones,
and then we just let go,
and move one, as if it was never there,
as if a part of you isn’t gone.
Sometimes after months,
sometimes after years,
sometimes decades.
How fleeting it all is the
lovers we once kissed,
the ones we now miss,
the ones that got away,
the ones we begged to stay,
the ones who broke us,
the ones who saved us,
who cracked us open,
and shattered us into pieces.
We think we can’t go on,
and yet somehow,
somewhere we do.
And worse, they do too.
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About Mila
I’m Mila. A mother of two. A Creative Director by a day, a writer of plays, poetry, films and fiction every spare moment I can find. My dream at this not so young age is to make writing and teaching of writing not just my creative life but my working life. Every sub and paid sub helps me get there.
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A few custom pieces I’ve created for my Paid Subscribers. Put a lot of love in these to make them truly special for each person.
Help me produce more indie plays, films, fiction and poetry and create a stage and community for other artists.
Help me produce more indie plays, films, fiction and poetry and create a stage and community for other artists.
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