For You

For You

I don’t know how to explain this, baby,
but it’s not you who’s giving me hell.
I know you’re trying, baby,
  trying to warm my hands with your baby-warm breath,
   trying to wipe away the black tears that stain my face,
    trying with all your might to shield me from my unavoidable night.
But, baby, I’ve been trying to tell you all along that
there’s a part of me, frozen, still, without a pulse, and
every day I pray that it would just break off into the warmth of your arms around me,
melting, silently, gently forming beads of sweat that gather around my heart.
Yet here I stand, and there you are, running towards me.
Your arms outstretched, your eyes pleading:

“……………..Baby.”      soft and gentle. like it should be, like it is.

baby, I can’t stop running from those times when “should be” was all there was,
when breathing wasn’t so easy at night, and aching tears chilled my battered skin,
  and you weren’t around to wrap me up warm.
I can’t stop running into the night,
  where things forget their names,
   where calm embraces everything,
    where I can disappear.
The night, tender and warm,
raindrops falling, chilling my skin, but warming my heart,
and I can finally sleep.

So baby, when you see my eyes flutter, looking out the window,
or you reach out to touch me and sometimes my arm moves away,
when I lie in bed, shaking,
baby,
please, just know that it was never you who gave me hell. never.
And as I fall into my nothingness,
it is your baby-warm breath against my ear,
your rough and hesitating fingertips wiping away the tears,
that steadies this pounding in my chest.
My man, my warmth,
“baby…………….”      It is you who has my soul.