CLOAKED IN LOVE

We don’t talk about the day I told her I love her

We chose to forget it and continue living in denial

We don’t talk about the day she said, “I like you Allan, I might date you for a little while, then maybe not after that’’

We just let Adele write about us, song after song

We don’t even meet anymore

We just bump into each other, give smiles hovered with wishes and carry on with our lives

As if we know where we’re headed

We’re like strangers who’ve known the other for eternity

Fantasies warped my expectations and I forgot how it’s like not to love

How it’s like not to love what you only have

Shadows from her past tightened their grip on her every time she thought of love

I saw her fall, dust herself up and tread on to be searched

I’ve seen her wipe old smiles and wear new faces

I’ve seen her enjoy being miserable alone, I’ve stretched out my hands and touched her soul with my fingertips

We’ve gone over her memories when dawn seemed far, and silently wished we’d make ours at every welcoming of dusk

I’ve seen her collect her memories and squeeze them into one single tear

She never loved her chest, she said it was too small but that didn’t matter to me as I was closer to her heart

She wanted someone to grow old with, but no, that’s too much responsibility to me, I mean, why not remain young forever together? Or spend time trying out different personas in our love stories

Sometimes it’s losing what you never had

Sometimes it’s saying no to something you haven’t found

Sometimes it’s never thinking about some-times you spend alone

Sometimes it’s wishing that you meet several decades later, when you’ve both learned to love the hurt away

Sometimes, this sometimes changes into every-time and there’s no escape

To give chances, to acknowledge that even the most broken of men walk amongst us

That even men with flaws expect kindness and love in return

That not every prince is charming

We don’t even text each other, I mean, why should we?

We never moved on, we just got accustomed to the pain

Everything beautiful reminds us of each other, and then our minds leave our bodies

We were halfway in

We see each other in every verse in a poem, every chapter in a book, in every character of some reel we’re watching

Ours is an untold story, lacking nothing but life, as a part of me dies upon the mention of her name

I even bought a new perfume to replace the scent of fresh fruits in a rainy season that always followed her soul

We’ve learnt to sing alone in the dark, and replace tears with new tears

We believe that moving on will happen when we learn not to love again

We even changed our diets, who wants to remember of a recipe that has memories for flavors?

We didn’t even leave each other escape routes to find each other; we just slept, and woke up to empty beds next to each other

We just took each other’s heart and left

We don’t even think it hurts that we miss each other while we’re just mere dreams

At every break of dawn, I thank her for loving me, because I then know what true love is, and she wasn’t it.