Won't let the light escape from me...

I should be in bed. In fact, I was. I just couldn't sleep. As is so often the case when I don't fall asleep quickly, my mind begins to think. And that means love, god, and etc.

I said a little prayer. More like, asked a few questions, the same one from, what? 2, 5, 10 years ago? Does it ever change?

So I said my peace (piece?). Then turned over, and had a little vision. A stool, a stage, a mic and a guitar. Out there, the faces, maybe just one of those faces, of someone I have loved, another love crashed and burned. Or, perhaps, someone who loved me who I didn't love back. I asked myself, on that stage, how I would introduce a song (any song, really) about love, love found, love lost, love whatever.

What would I say to them? To Jessyka, Katey, Jess, Dana, Becca, Melissa? To Tara, Rachel, Kathy, Stephanie, Bethy, Lynette... to any of them, past, present, future, almost, never was?



It is funny how love works. Its funny how we, as human beings, turn it into such an impersonal, inhuman thing. There have been times when I have loved, and really, truly loved. And sometimes, that love hits a brick wall. There have been other times when I am that brick wall that someone else's love is smacking against, futile and twisting and empty because I am not reciprocating.

We really are callous, selfish people. We tell one girl that we love her, and she disappears for 6 months - won't call, won't write, disappears of the map. We tell one girl we like her, and she seduces us, sleeps with us, fills our head with hopes and dreams, and then disappears... dead? Or just too chicken to say she doesn't want to see us? Does it matter? Does it hurt any less? We do this while another girl over here needs us... while one won't stop texting, while one won't stop calling, and while one won't stay out of our business. We ignore them, we ignore their feelings, even as we bitch, moan, HATE, HURT over the fact that these other girls are doing those same things to us.

Now, change "we" and "us" to "I" and "me." Change "one girl" and "another girl" to "you" and "you."

Or take your pick of a handful of the people connected in each of our lives.

Life isn't hard. But love is hard. And we make it harder... we add religion, jealousy, past relationships, a lifetime of hurt and hope and dreams that no one can live up to, no one can cure. We pine for those that don't want us, and cast aside the ones that do want us but whom we don't want. Everyone has been the hurt and the hurter.

And maybe this is what God means when he says that man is evil. It sure feels like it.

I sit and I think... maybe I ask for too much. Maybe I want too much, or what I want isn't what I should want? But I am selfish. I haven't dated a girl who was my type - one quick crash and burn fuck-up aside - since college. Of the handful of girls I have dated, and yes, cynics in the audience, of the handful of girls I've slept with, too... I haven't wanted, loved, needed all of them. I manage to destroy and hurt the ones I don't want and need... and I managed to let myself get hurt and destroyed by the ones I did need, I did want.

Have you ever felt like, if only you could've loved someone more? If only I could've loved more, then so and so would've stayed, would've loved me more, would've worked out. DO you have any IDEA what that fucking feels like, to stand there with your broken dreams, bloodied, defeated, dead on the floor? Have you ever cried so fucking hard that you lost your breath, that you almost passed out for lack of oxygen? Have you ever hurt so much that the only way to sleep was whiskey, vicatin and sleeping pills, all together?

I have. And that is where these songs come from. That's where they are going. That's what they are about, the lives we lead, the pain we cause, the joy we hope for. Love is a wonderful thing, but it's a wicked thing, too.

Maybe that's why I write. It's the only way I know how to humanize love. It's the only way I know how to deal with my best friend falling for my dream girl, for my close friend feeling tossed aside, for my roommates too busy with their girlfriends to hang out anymore. Mostly, it's how I deal with what is left inside of MY hopes and dreams.

A tiny glimmer, a small spark... lies deep, deep down. Ashamed. Afraid. But hot. Burning so hot it hurts. And God, wherever and whoever he is, I thank him it is there, even as I wonder if/why he punishes me for these broken attempts at capturing some kind of Eden here on earth.

I won't let that darkness swallow it. Won't let the light escape from it. But it IS hard. And ever time I see your face, or your face, or your face, I am reminded by how easily you cast me aside, how easily I cast you aside, all in the name of sex and god and love and happiness.

Ashamed. Afraid. But hot... still. The sad thing is something, some time, has got to change. Have you ever watched an ember in a fire? How beautiful it is with its orange glow? What becomes of the ember? If you add to it, it flares to life, becoming a consuming fire, hot and bright. And, if you don't, it dies. If you don't it dies.

I don't want to compromise. I don't want to settle. And neither do I wish to be selfish. Neither do I wish to be callous, uncaring, a brick wall.

I will not be ashamed. I will no longer fear. I will go down fighting... with guitar in hand, with throat sore from singing and roaring, with fingers bloodied and bruised. With heart on sleeve. If the ember dies, so be it. I'm going to make damn sure you don't ever forget the glow for the time that it lasted.