Don't Kiss Me

(To be read aloud)

Don’t
Kiss me.

Because if you kiss me,
You will be.

I have met and lost the love of my life not once but
Twice.
And though my mind is blind
And can’t see past all the other mundane catastrophes that make up my life,
Both were the worst thing to ever happen to me.
See, I give everything when I love.
I, like the saints to their gods, lay down my very soul for ever and ever.
Amen.

What I want you to believe is the divine cliché.
What they all say:
It’s not you, it’s me,
And I don’t think I can do it a third time.

If you move from who you are to someone
Who will be, to me,
If you become thrice, and with your whim and will entice
The very fibre of my vice,
I don’t think I could bare it.

There was another, once.
Even now, my spirit entwined, she displays her grace simply by never letting me
Down.
But she could.
And were her beauty anything less than perfect she would not
So piously protect
My heart.
A labour of love, I know.
Were she to fade away tomorrow, though I have invested nothing but everything I would be
Lost.
Even though she never found me. Had me.
Because that’s how love can be sometimes.

So don’t
Kiss me.

Because you’re not one of them.
You have a world so completely beyond me and mine.
Don’t say you don’t.
You do.
Because I know you.
I’ve looked into your eyes on those dark days and random nights,
When, to my surprise, your perfect form had compromised.
Into tears.
Fears.
That some part of your inside world was not alright.
Some melody of your personal private symphony was dreadfully
Off key.

I knew you then.
I held you softly until the music of your mind gently regained its composure.
Until the beat grew steady and strong again, so that you could carry on.
And then you did.
And then you left.

I love unconditionally.
Each and every one without fail or relent, once my heart gives consent.
And I know that’s not the way it should be.
I should be free,
To set the conditions of my intuitions,
To let the natural and normal ebb and flow of life
Give and take away again.
But I’m not.
My lips sing old jazz standards,
And kisses build dreams.

So if your lips meet mine, though the time would be sublime,
Something that inspires the movement of a moment that mere minutes cannot explain.
I could never leave.

That I fear far more than tears.

Don’t
Kiss me.