Because it's nearly Valentine's day (that day where humanity somehow feels compelled to pay homage to melodramatic sentiment), here's something I churned out about a lifetime ago. Warning, this is a bit PG-13 (due to violent language). Obviously written during the crescendo of my adolescent angst. Think of it what you will. I merely offer it to the gods.

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Love songs aren't pretty when they're lived out. Lyrics speak nothing of the pain stretched out in perpetua, the anger mixed into the passion, the violence intertwined with the intensity. They speak of the happiness, and the broken hearts, and the healing, and the moving on, but they never tell you about the wasting away because your heart was never broken. Because your heart was too strong. So instead it keeps on beating against the odds. Even if the one it beats for has already left. Lyrics speak nothing of that kind of emptiness.

No, you learn that for yourself.

You learn it in the middle of the night, wondering if you're the only one on this goddamn earth who actually means her forevers. You learn it when you're watching him play with his kids, a father to someone else's children. You learn it when you watch him struggle with his life, a life he no longer lives alone, leaving you no place in it.

You learn it in the way he looks at you, empathy mixed with compassion. You learn it in the way he holds your hand, like a child with a new-found friend. You learn it in the immediacy of every moment, because every single second you spend together is devoid of a future.

You learn it in silence, because you are not like them who can transfer love like a goddamn potted plant. You learn it in silence because you are not like them who will let time heal all wounds. Because you know your love is not a fucking wound.

You learn it when you're restraining your fingers from touching his face, when you're holding back the words that want to spill out from the madness inside you, when you're smiling like a baboon because he remembered to ask you about your migraine.

You learn it with all the dents on all your pillows, with all the games you play, with all the customized mystique and the meaningless secrets. You learn it with every choice you make because it's a choice you make without him in the horizon. You learn it when you wake up in the morning because he's not there. You learn it when it's someone else's hand holding yours, someone else's lips kissing yours, someone else's body on top of yours in some goddamn car in an empty parking lot.

And you learn it every fucking day. A lesson rammed down your head every fucking day. A pain that threatens to swallow you every fucking day. An image of him in your mind you kiss every fucking moment of every fucking day.

You learn to say that you're getting better. You learn to get over him. You learn to get over him over and over. You learn to remember to forget. You learn to lie to yourself.

And you yearn for an end to it all. You feel like every piece of you is screaming for this to stop. You feel it eating at you every time you try to breath.

Yet you learn to exist in your anguish. To live with it. To live with it over and over. You learn to smile and grit your teeth and go on learning.

Maybe you will learn to live without him wreaking havoc on your thoughts. Maybe you will get married and have your own children. Maybe you will even learn to love another man. But you know that although both loves may be true, their truths will not be the same.

You are a twisted kind of martyr who revels in her misery. Who will content herself with bits and pieces. Who will offer herself on his altar.

You are the princess who will wait in her tower until she rots into a forgotten corpse. You are the prince who will never be able to rescue the only one who really matters. You are the witch who will die unfulfilled.

But not defeated. Never defeated.

Because your love is yours. It does not belong to this world. It does not bow down to anything or anyone. You love the only way you know how. You love the only way you can let yourself love. And you mean forever. Beyond till death do us part.

And because you love him, you will let your demands remain unanswered. You will not collect on promises. You will not make him turn his back on his choices. You will not gnaw your way into his life like a fucking rat.

You will let him move on while he sweeps his footsteps in the sand, so that no one will know he was ever there. You will forgive him for doing what he must. You will forgive him for making you into a memory. You will forgive him for tucking that memory into a dark corner of his mind. You will understand.

And you will give him the only gift left for you to give -- a life bursting at the seams, filled with contentment and paved roads and shining smiles. Without space for you in it.

A gift you will learn to pay for in full. Slowly. One agonizing bittersweet day at a time.

Disclaimer: Lines in italics are not my own. Credit goes to the authors of "Wasted" (Issue #4), stupid clichés, "Einstein's Dreams", over-used wedding vows, and "The God of Small Things". Some were paraphrased.