Thief

It is a strange thing to feel the absence of regret in situations where it would fit perfectly. My friends think that I am attached to attention, that I have not moved out of vanity. I think the world of people when I love them. I see the things that make up who they are for what they are, the reasons that I adored them in the first place. Sometimes people have those eyes that look like stained glass in an afternoons last light. Sometimes people have a voice that feels like cooled down coffee just before bed. Sometimes people have aspects of themselves that they don’t necessarily admire. I think these are my favorite parts. They cover these things up like they’re not good enough for the world we live in, they think to themselves that everything must be in order for them to be accepted, to be successful, to be pretty. I like these people most and I think it’s often seen as madness, like I’m wrong for being partial to the bits of humanity that need a little help. Sometimes I stay up past my bedtime, which is earlier and earlier as I grow older. I spend this time remembering the moments that I’ve stumbled across in sheer luck. Moments like an exchange of rings or when I’ve been a thief and taken something after hardly asking for permission. Moments like placing my hand in an ant hill because I’m too focused on the removal of clothing. Moments like painting rocks and leaving them for someone else or forgetting them all together. I give my things away when I wish to be remembered and I take things when I don’t care to let go. My heart is too broken to work properly, like the hearts inside my friends. Their hearts behave correctly. Their hearts know how to patch the holes and stop the bleeding while my legs get heavier from the leaking that happens internally. My steps become labored and then I tend to rest for periods of time. I listen to music and pet dogs and force myself to do the things I like doing. I smoke too much and the headaches hurt but I still need the music playing loudly. I think I like people too much for my own good. I think I tell myself they’ve got good reasons for the things they do or don’t do, while picking apart every action that I ever took. I wonder if I loved gently enough. I wonder if I went out of my way enough when really love is never out of my way, it’s who I am. I wonder if the people around me understand that I’m a bunch of pieces held together with the glue you’d find in a classroom. I wonder if the people that say they love me know how easily the parts can come undone and how difficult it is to hold them back in place. I imagine that I look like everything is copacetic. Strong and powerful and poetic, taking charge of life one day at a time. I’m really just the deer in the headlights of depression, continuously crawling out of a grave that reshapes and resizes itself perpetually. If I keep moving there’s the illusion of progress. If I continue to persist and persevere then perhaps there may be a rope or root to reach for in the end. I don’t believe in those things though. I believe in loving people without caution but from different distances so that they don’t find themselves decorating the same grave as I do. I believe in love with sword and shield thrown to the side but I’ve been known to pickup one or even both at a time, in fear of finding out that they can see the pieces held together. I think that if people got close enough they could see I’m soft and gentle and kind and considerate and that I guard these things about me with my life. It’s easier to give than to have someone take them without asking. I am afraid that one crafty hand will distract while the other slips itself around whichever piece it aims to take and I won’t recognize the play. I’ll lose another part after having come so far and only having a handful of them left. It is strange to feel the absence of regret when such a thing could save me all the trouble in the world. But then again I wouldn’t be much of anything if I wasn’t made of what I’m made of. I think that I enjoy being at the mercy of the universe. Being soft and incapable of becoming jaded for long. I think that I enjoy being a target for the people that need things from me because I’m useful in those moments. I imagine there will come a time when giving these last pieces will be a delight, that I will hand them over without being argumentative. I imagine there will come a time when they’re all that I have left to give and even then it will still be in my nature to serve.