Bus Ride Conversations

Bus ride conversations,
That's what we used to have,
way before the whole, y'know.
Now there lingers only the aftershock of phone conversations too brief for comfort of any sort,
but I don't want to talk about those, I want to talk about the beginning, starting out;
those long drawn, dusk and dawn conversations that stretched out over cacophonous highways and past skyscrapers too tall to fathom, we never craned our necks to look at them,
our words were enough, they kept the world at bay,
and I would say "I wish you didn't have to go home"
and I would look at your face, and realize only much later when it was too late, that home was people, not place,
but this will not erase the memory, of how we would whisper secrets to ourselves and sing,
sing along to songs on your little black i-pod, one in your ear, one in mine,
we would keep time to the beat by tapping our seats and annoying the hell out of the other passengers, we were the suspicious people the announcements tell you to look out for, we were more then mere commuters kept penned in our routines and then carted off to the rest of our lives like so much.
We were beings,
inhabiting our own little world we bred butterflies in our stomachs and blew out promises like bubbles and the parameters of this world were two dirty, vandalized seats at the very back,
you know, the ones tattooed with too many thoughtless "I Was Here's" and "I Love You's" and so on, and we had bus ride conversations, spilling out dreams in between traffic lights,
making decisions and clutching them tightly between out tangled fingers,
because despite not knowing where we were going on the bumpy bus ride that was this relationship,
those words tattooed on the back of those two dirty seats said everything anyway;
I Am Here,
and I Love You.

Morning Call

I was caught a little by surprise,
just a little,
when your voice slipped through the cracks of morning,
and found its way to the other end of the phone.
Hoarse, and a little like hope,
just a little,
you said grand things from a safe place somewhere far away, and I smiled,
because I knew the lie for a lie,
and I smiled,
just a little,
and kept your secret, safe;
revenge for the precious things of mine
that you had not known how to treasure.

Today, I Decide To Leave You

What love is this that renders me a slave,
not just in action but also in expression.
What love is this that judges me,
as true lovers ought not to be.

I love you, and that is all there is to that.
Must I proclaim it, must you believe it,
must I be a lover who swears fidelity?
Can I not just be left to the business of loving?

I do not grudge you your time,
your friends, your new lovers.
I do not grudge you your joys,
your passions, your dislikes.
Days spent in sufficient distraction,
nights in her tender disposition.
But I do grudge you your disdain,
your anger, your hatred,
your willingness to despise.

Me? I am stripped bare of all,
pretenses, no romantic notions,
no vile jealous streaks,
no, not even indifference.
I am left with emptiness.

Today I decide to leave you,
only you don't know it yet.
So I call to hear your familiar voice,
and we make funny talk,
like we always do.
You are so funny.
I am usually funny too,
but funnier than you.
Then, you tell me about your bad week,
and the terrible fight,
about another phone call.
And I am left to stumble on,
my farewell speech.

Today I decide to leave you,
only to find out,
that you had already left me.
You are so funny,
and i am funnier.