on

loving you has always been about

leaving the lights on

 

because the compulsion

to turn it off and on again

is the compulsion

to leave before anything starts

to put up my defenses

to never let anyone in

 

and leaving it on

makes my skin crawl

like thousands of little critters

crawling underneath my skin

my muscles twisting

my gut wrenching

 -- a need for escape

a need to be away

because away meant safety

 

but safety meant solitude

a deceptive sense of peace

safety is the ship being in the harbor

when it was meant to sail

 

safety is losing you

losing us

yet loving you

is losing me

Author's Note

this may have been in reference to OCD by Neil Hilborn in Button Poetry and that one line from Cathilda Ceili from Fantasy High Senior Year