Borderline

I try to understand what cannot be understood
and you tell me that my brain lacks the ability to
digest the severity of your case
and it is best that I save my energy for the sane.

I melt in you.
My eyes burn holes into your soul.
I watch it shrink and numb itself
and you grow weaker when strength
should be a welcome reprieve.

You tell me not to speak of the
voices — they do not calm,
they do not ease, all you know from them
is the want to create havoc.

And I stand in your fire,
waiting for the flames to die down,
but they find no home of their own.
They are building their castle
in your head as a nesting place,
frying each of us where we stand.

I tell you that I will not leave
that I am by your side,
that I have been and will be
yet you yearn to push me away
believing in abandonment more
than my word.

“What can I do to help?”
You curl your lips into a Q,
take a deep breath, and whisper,
“Nothing.”
And I know what fear needs
from the downtrodden bent on
being pulled ashore from
salty seas.

I am here,
waiting for you to take risks,
certain that I will send the odds
spinning into space.
Certain that I will love
you even when you think
I have lost the power to do so.

©Tremaine L. Loadholt, 2018. All Rights Reserved

Related posts:

A veces tenemos lugares especiales, a los cuales llegamos mágicamente sin darnos cuenta. Mi lugar es el Tres Picos, es raro, pero me di…

The Inclusive Startup Accelerator operates from October 24th through December 5th, 2020. Participants will gain automatic entry to a $10,000 Pitch Competition in January of 2021! First Founders Inc…

A programming language is a set of instructions and rules that a computer can understand and execute in order to perform a specific task or set of tasks. It is used to create software, apps, and…