Elegy

I spend nights awake, listening to the clock chime away the seconds of my existence. I think of what I’ve done and I wait for my conscience to consume me. Sounds flash across the darkness and I feel for the weighty comfort of my gun against my belly. When the silence returns and the hairs on the back of my hands lay flat, I turn my gaze to her pillow and wonder if there will ever be anyone there.

When my eyelids grow heavy I see her waiting in the gloom behind them. Then my heart begins to beat again. In her presence every fire is awakened. Even the curves of her lips excite me. She puts her delicate hand in mine and whispers about forever. There were days when I could think of nothing else.

My groin will never again swell at the thought of another woman. My toes will never curl at the feel of anyone else’s skin. I can find no greater safety behind the barrel of a gun than what I find in her eyes.

Sequentia

I would like to never see her face again. I would like to know there is a place where her eyes cannot reach inside of me. I am naked in her vision, and all my parts shrivel to their smallest standard. I quiver at the thought of the things she does; the things she wishes for me to do. She laughs when I say that I would kill for her.

She asks me why I turn my eyes from her gaze. She passes through my understanding and takes the parts of her I’ve stolen. She wonders why I cannot breathe in the moments her lips curve down. I wonder if she will ever be more than a dream.

My trembling hands trace slow lines across her perfect back. Beneath me, she directs my pleasure as if it thrived in spite of me. In the mornings I wonder how I thought that my servitude would be the chains to hold her affection.

Coda

I watched Alana for years not knowing how to put words to the emotions I felt. When she died, the words thundered toward me as if startled and at once cut free.

I wanted to tell her how dirty I feel when I’m with other women. I wanted to tell her that sometimes I feel like a demon. A terrible, dark creature. A lurker, eating at the parts of people that are weak. Feeding on their desire to be loved by someone in spite of their faults.

Unconditionally.

Everyone needs to hear the words ‘I need you.’ I can mouth the words time and time again, to face after face, but the truth behind them belongs to Alana.

My need is etched into a face I will never feel.

I know she isn’t gone, not in my heart. I keep her there, waiting for her to wipe away the gooseflesh, to steal the bags from beneath my eyes. Without her, who will fill the space where I used to keep my dreams?