The Agony of “Closeness”

I know your secrets.

They aren’t really hidden well.

They are written all

Over your face.

The way your eyes hide, the way your shy smile evaporates into that well-worn snarky, wry expression

And you and I sit down to order coffee

For the hundredth time to discuss Superman for the next year over

The growing gaping hole that is our social fulfillment that gets bigger and bigger like the potholes we argue about in the City.

It’s not okay to get too close,

Because then the hole gets too easy to see.

Once our hands touch,

The agony of our

Shared moments

Becomes too sweet,

Too palpable,

Too stuck in the middle of my perception of

What I call life to actually be: “hard reality”

And I don’t know how to handle

So many raw ideas in one moment

With you.

I have No Secrets around you, my dear

Friend.

Yet, I know I have too much to hide when I

my breath is hard to catch,

Like how a first baseman

Needs to be prepared to catch a high or low ball,

And my darling,

I’ll never be your hero

Like Keith Hernandez, to ever really catch up

With the way our hearts align and collide,

A dream of agony, silence and grief,

Of mine and mine alone,

Trying to get you to unlock something

And show me your agony,

Because I wanna know what it feels like

So I can tell you how absurd it was for all of us to hide it in

The first place.