I know how to love with every fibre of my being. I know how to nurture and build. I know how to be loyal. I know how to be the one that hustles to keep the ship afloat. I know how to forgive indiscretions big and small. I know how to hang on with tenacity until what I’ve manifested for the relationship comes true, or it all goes up in flames. There are no half measures with me.

But it’s not about that. It’s about wanting it to be my turn for once. It’s about wanting to experience something real and meaningful again before I shuffle off this mortal coil.

I want to be loved fiercely. I want to take someone’s breath away. I want someone to think I’m so amazing that they wonder how they got so lucky. I don’t want or need perfection, I just need commitment. I need to feel like someone out there thinks I’m worth taking a risk for. I need to know I matter. That I’m seen.

But even as I envision the way I want someone to feel for me, I know I’m not worthy of it… maybe at one stage I was, but now I’m just old and broken with nothing of value to exchange for being made the central object of another person’s desire. And so I just give up, content to sink back in a numbness that only serves to make me more numb, more disconnected from this weary, fucked up life.

…

You create these fantasies in your head that you are worthy of love
That someone somewhere could look at you, really see
And right away say, “Yes there! That one’s The One!”

You capture every look, every gesture, every humankindness shown
And pin it like butterflies with its ephemeral wings under glass
You think these will keep you warm when the bitter winds of loneliness moan.