Uncomfortable to love

The Colour of Love (CAI 2024)

I try saying

instead of, they don't love me

I try saying, they

find me uncomfortable to love.

And I'm sure that's true 

I'm sure if you find yourself inexplicably

loving me 

maybe that's a lot,

and not what you expect

if you stumbled into love unprepared

for all the ways I'm me; maybe

the blame's not mine; maybe

it's just a situation, 

something that happens all the time, 

mis-matched needs and expectations

despite affection, spiting love

bad transmission, a frequency above

or below your song, maybe what's wrong

is your love itself, that you love me, anyway

even though, in spite

and that's a position rife with disappointment

not every love feels loving.

I suspect my thought experiment encodes delusion

I hope so; anyway, I build illusions every night

to carry me through the days.

Like it matters

All my selfies look tentative

I think I'm fine but the fine lines of not daring to hope poke through

wobbly smile, cautious eyes, shrinking chin

a face within a face, a shroud

not me, surely not the god that I am

staring back from this weak place of shame

not proud, not strong, not well, after all, not okay

on the edge, teeter totter

day after day treading water wasting space

trying to live

like I matter at all.