I ran away from you to Lake Arrowhead
I didn't tell you where I was going
I knew I had a 24 hour grace period before you were done making
your film
I went to an aa meeting
And my share read like a tale of a battered housewife
I felt everyone's eyes on me
The rehab kids in the back row stopped throwing spitballs at
each other and stared at me
I fucking hate my life.
I waited after the meeting in thе parking lot for any of the
local ladies
to come up to mе
Only one did, Kira.
"I don't really have much advice for you" she said
I was in over my head
out of my league
In the wrong place wrong season wrong time wrong face
and I knew it
But I didn't know what to do
You asked me to marry you
You said your mother was dying and you couldn't fathom your
life without a woman in it.
I was tempted but it didn't seem like a good enough offer
I wanted more than that
even though I've never had anything.
Not one person to call if I changed my dollar in for quarters to
ask what they thought about it.
But there's always been just a little tiny piece of me inside
the size of a small slice of angel cake that knew
somewhere somehow
That I deserved better than someone like you.
So I got back into my truck in the dark
my little yellow pamphlet with two numbers on it that I would
never call crumpled up
Kira with her local area code and gratefully also her
sponsor, Gail from Palmdale.
I didn't feel better and I didn't use the numbers but I thought
that I had been very brave that I did the best I could, sharing
in a big room, tears streaming down my face in my high school
flannel
just to say
"The man that I love hates me.
But it would be easier to stay."
As the last person's lights flooded over my windshield
the night became very quiet
and I thought-
If I go back and I end it
How would I handle driving down your street and it becoming a
distant memory
not reality
no longer sweet.
Sweet the way it tastes in my mouth to say your name
sweet like when I was young, driving down those roads before we
were done
before any big battles were lost or won
unbeknownst to everyone
except for you and me.
As Sweet as a junkie's limited concept of love can be.
I thought cause u were clean u were a lot like me
wanting to be closer to something big and free.
But some people need their secrets
And now my greatest battle will be
this unchained melody
In my heart
From not having you next to me.
To shut the door on the past and step
blindly
into the abyss
no destination intact
the only direction set in the Compass - to move forward.
So I drove
back and forth
on the Rim of the World Hwy
and the beauty of its name reminded me
That I was beautiful
That some things are beautiful for no reason.
Not everyone needs to pretend to love their girlfriend just
because their mother is dying
or because they're afraid of a change in season
Anyway
I don't have a pretty couplet to give resolution to this poem
nothing very eloquent to say
except that I was brave
and it would've been easier to stay
