7. In Loving You

I wonder if I'm the only one left thinking about it. 

I know you needed to leave for your own good. 

That's such a brave thing to do. 

In the face of all that could be, you chose yourself. It didn't mean one without the other. It was a choice that benefited both parties.

Months later, I can't help, but still wonder how you are. I wonder if someone else found the beautiful parts of you in the starkness of the world.

In my selfishness, I hope no one else has. 

In loving you, I hope you find the right love for you regardless of who it is.

In my selfishness, I hope it is me. 

In loving you, I hope it is an honest and kind love.

And in you loving yourself, I am learning to love myself. 

I thought loving myself was empowering myself -- seeking out simple pleasures, reckless engagement, dancing with the devil, jazz without the blues.

Loving myself is, in actuality, peace -- holding myself in a quiet solitude, surrounded by uplifting people, accepting the harshness, and yet choosing to still be the honey of a dying flower.

So as time takes its course around the sun once more, seasons change, wrinkles crease,

I don't know what to do with all this love. All I know is

in loving you, I have cemented the fighter in me.

In my selfishness, I have worked hard on myself.

In loving you, I have felt grief many a nights.

In my selfishness, I curse the moon that reminds me of our last night.

In loving you, I must love myself and let you go.

I'm just struggling to find a way.