You asked me to never write you down.

As an artist, pain has always been threaded into my bones. Once, you asked me why I’m so sad. I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. At least, not until now. Pain is so familiar to me that no matter where I go, what I do, whom I surround myself with, or who I become; I’m still itching to dig around inside my veins. Find something tangible that I can pull out by the roots and lay out for everyone to see it.

I want to see you written down on a page in this notebook. The one in my hands, it begs to have your name etched inside it’s small margins.

You forbade me to ever place you upon a page, so instead I’ve got you running through my veins.

You’re made of stardust and silence, things even I can’t find. But your soul is made of hard rock and white bone, I see the cracks forming now. I stitched your name inside my mouth, as to keep you from spilling out onto a page. But sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night, to find your memory laid out beside me upon an empty pillow.

Pain is such a familiar feeling, that now without it, I’m so unsure. You took pieces of yourself from my life slowly. One at a time. Replacing your body, with memories.

Last night, it was so cold. The winter wind curled around me so tightly, it reminded me of you. How your love was icy water trapped inside my skin. Never will I have the courage to look back and try to find you. If I did, maybe I’d try to fight you, see how much I could take before you broke me again. But I can’t. I won’t. It’d kill me, I think. I’m too afraid to face you.

And for that, some days I’m glad I’m such a coward.