He makes me feel

How can he even look at me?

So close.

So near.

I feel his breath beating down on me.

I feel his pulse racing in my mouth.

His golden hued gray mirrors reflecting such heavy pools, and I sink into them.

****

Why does he make me feel,

I don’t want to feel.

****

I am not here; but you make me feel the present.

Right here and now.

I touch your arm in court,

You let me keep my hand there.

I admitted to murder,

Yet you show me empathy.

My mind is cracked, my heart is burnt

And still, you try to seek out my humanity.

You make me feel like I could have

Something real,

Something sweet,

Something else unlike what I had before.

How can you even look at me, Edward?

I can barely look at myself.

You asked me to write to you,

So I did.

I’m a murderer but here I am,

Trying to stop thinking of you,

And your highly impassioned speech to save me,

When all I want to tell you is no matter what happens now

Even if they kill me, too,

All I

Want

You

To know

Is,

You saved me anyway.

(I could never feel, even as a child I was forced to pretend I had no feelings at all)

But, you,

made me feel,

And that’s more real to me than my whole life.

~~~~~~~

Author note: this is about my characters Edward and John in my yet to be published story The Half Paper Moon. It is in John’s perspective, the one on trial for murder. Edward is his defense lawyer.