Nickel Wound
i remember nights when we used to bathe by candlelight in our own private sanctuary; water glistened on our skin. apparently love and time, a ring and a promise, were not worthy of conversation, so festering words shall remain unspoken between us, and it seems we're content to let bitterness overrun our feelings like ivy. the green shroud that we've used to cover the debris may yet bear fruit but i won't be there to harvest it. i was there in sickness and i was there in health but you only seemed to be in it when times were good and it was convenient. and this is your legacy: a broken heart, stolen goods and a ceremony of lies conducted somewhere in hawaii. we used to call your sex a nickel so that we could speak in code, in secret dialects of desire. your betrayal left a hole about that size in my heart and there are times when i still feel like my life is leaking out. we tried to recover the tenderness that both of us had lost by developing a new language for our love and now that lexicon is lost to history and infidelity. i managed to recover the olive parka you took when you departed and i promptly wrapped it around my body. so why am i still shivering?