Dear Love.

Dear Love,

I'm breaking up with you.

No, I don't have to have a reason but I'll give you one anyway.

I'm tired of all the lies. I'm tired of all the waiting. I figured I'd finish things the right way, since I couldn't figure out when they'd even started.

So, love, here it is.

I guess I'm setting you free, but don't forget how the middle of October feels when the weather is cooling down, and the air bites. Remember to yourself the chills that run through December, like a child nearing Christmastime. Play with the past as intent for the future, the way promise-makers do on the first of January.

I'm sorry love, and I am. It's not a lie this time. They come to my lips too easily, to my fingertips. I don't bother trying to stop them when I realize it doesn't matter, but three little words that kicked me every time I said them...

Or typed them...

Let's go back to a courtship where I didn't write to you for three days because fear touched off a light inside and warned that I was losing myself. Let's break down into something less real, like these elements forced into periodic slots in a table men built on a whim.

Let's not be ourselves. That should be easy for us. We've spent enough time doing that already into the moments when I see my face in your eyes and wonder, who the fuck are you?

Because I'm tired of these lies I tell myself, like I could end up knowing who you are. Like I think I'm capable of greatness when really all I can do is imagine it, then write until the great pours from me into someone else's being. I'm a writer, not a person. I'm a star, not a human being.

And you know, I still miss him sometimes, even when I'm with you, but I feel like there's almost obligation to forget, and yet I can't because he's a man and you're still a boy.

I don't know where the difference is when he knows less about the world than you ever had, but it is there. Maybe it's locked on the child-like assumption that everything will be all right, and the choices that we make will only affect others. And only in the long run.

I want to be back in control again because I gave over too damn much too fast. Too much at once, and now I want it back because I lied to you and I lied to myself when I had one face and now the restless second self wants to come out and destroy.

She hasn't signed the death warrant yet but it's still in the works and eventually... Eventually it'll come to pass, the way everything else does.

And maybe if you wait long enough I'll forgive you for things you can't control. Maybe I'll forgive you for not being blond and being two inches too tall. Maybe I'll give in and let it go that you have good vision but can't carry a tune.

And that you go to school in Canada, not here.

Because I think, given enough time, I could forgive those things. But it's the eyes, love. Your brown-to-black eyes. Those I'll never forgive.

Maybe if your eyes were blue, or if you were blind - maybe then things would be absolutely perfect. Or maybe just less real.

Reality follows me. We're close enemies. She's my stalker. Maybe too close. I'm her lover. Best friends, forever.

But your eyes aren't blue and you aren't blind so even when you aren't aroused as all fuck I can still see myself in your eyes and every word I say comes out like a lie to myself.

I can't do it anymore, love. I can't keep telling lies to my reflection. She's the only one who always accepts me for who I am, instead of who I pretend to be. I still owe her. She hasn't said anything, but when I stare into your eyes, her disapproval stares back.

I'm more afraid that one day she won't. That one day I'll be all alone without even a reflection to comfort me.

So -

Dear Love,
I'm getting rid of you
now
so I can save
part of myself
for when we
are finally
disillusioned.