Your rolling white horses.

011: a vent in the mangled shape of a poem - a response to a revelation.

"You made me feel like an equal - but I’m better than you and you should know that by now.”

-Boygenius

With my hands outstretched before me, 
giving and strained for connection, 
I gaze upon your reflecting waters. 
You are an ocean of doubt and insecurity.
My body is dripping, my clothes darkened -
the droplets creating ripples in your surface. 
My very soul is darkened by your waves of sadness. 
The sun has risen, the storm has lifted 
and for once suddenly all is clear.
I know who I am, who you are. 
The shore is right there, just barely in sight. 
The darkness of night has lifted, midnight turning to dawn. 
I can see the horizon for once - your crashing waves subsided.
Only when I knew to turn away and run from the tsunami
did I realise you have always been dragging me under. 
Your waves, your sadness. My joy, my effort -  
my little sailboat a lifeline on your rolling white horses. 
I sent my line, my hook, into your vastness - so unreadable. 
With my body shaking from the cold (yet battling for you still),
I waited and waited in my little sailboat for you. 
Not only did you never answer me, leaving me stranded there in the dark
but you made sure I felt your chill. Your rejection.
Your sea sprayed me, drenching me to the bone
a sadness so contagious finding its root in my pliant body.
I took those drops and let them seep into my skin
cause in the dark poison rain can look like showers of love. 
Only when you left - when your waters cooled and left me stranded, 
only then did the sun start to peek through your clouds of doubt. 
That sun of clarity and brightness and truth - 
it showed me something so glaring and obvious I'd never seen. 
The love and warmth I saw in your cold waves
was my own reflection looking right back at me. 
My love, my joy, my attention. 
I saw in your sadness and in your loneliness
the love I poured and poured and poured into you
like an oil spill, it stayed and coated the top of your sea. 
You never felt me or my effort. You refused to see me. 
I watched myself dance on your ocean;
an illusion of reciprocation to cover your nonchalance. 
As the day came I saw with utmost clarity
that this entire time I had been loving myself.
And how easy I found it to love, this reflection. 
How quickly I doted and dreamed - domesticated myself. 
You smothered me with your sadness and sank my ship
all too happy to let me die with you, yet all alone. 
When I held you for support those dark and stormy nights
I let myself ignore you drip right through my fingers - 
yet the rays of daylight illuminate everything I refused to see.
The fact you were never there in the way I was, 
never let me in your abundance whilst you consumed mine. 
I understand now that you slipped right by me 
a thief in the very night I so desperately worshipped;
my dignity stolen without a second glance.
Only now as I stare at the sun dance on your waves the way I used to
do I see how disfigured something so beautiful and bright
becomes in the presence of something so destructive. 
And only now, in the wake of your monsoon
do I know for a fact that I was not a lifeline or a lighthouse.
I wasn't your home guiding you back from the depths of the sea.
I wasn't anything but another passing ship to roll over your back;
a drifting memory destined to remain in the murky waters of yesterday. 
With this truth I now bask in, hands dropped to my own sides for once,
I turn around and set sails for recovery in the arms of new friends
and the comforting embrace of a new day
Never again to be shadowed by the dark of your midnight blues. 

---

This poem can be considered, if you might like, as a conclusion to the story I’ve spun in my last poem, ‘I dream of you still, by the way’. As that poem was concocted around the idea of being consumed and drunk on a person, this section demonstrates the harsh reality once the connection is ended. You realise what you thought you had was never there - or at least not what you thought it was. Honestly this was very personal to me and brought up from a lot of memories and thoughts. This can be applied romantically, platonically, familiarly etc etc. There are people who we love who someday come to show us that they never had the intention of giving that back. The things we say are deep and meaningful and yet you can never reach past their surfaces. They’re too secluded, too confusing, too consumed by themselves. I spent this week reflecting on that poem so many times and even discussed its themes and contents to someone and realised pretty instantly what a fool I had been in the past - letting people consume me whilst I drowned. The love I had to give was never taken and as a result I never ever got anything back. For me then day came and as I explained what I was feeling did I realise how much I was feeling. Alone. I felt pathetic and embarrassed and realised that I never felt that much back - I was seeing responses to things I did, I said, I wanted. I wasn’t necessary the same way the people I put a focus on in my life were to me. Moving and meeting new people and letting go of the things that no longer served me made me realise I needed to move on and start letting people who care about me in, rather than die on the hill that someday the people I care about might someday start care about me back. There is no honour in that kind of death. There is only my own dissatisfaction.

With this revelation I turn towards a new day and realise my worth. I am a good person who does things for people without being asked, I offer up my time and affection and my advice to those who need it regardless of who they are. I am smart and compassionate and I see deeper than skin. I read things beneath the page. I will no longer waste that on people who do not wish to do the same for me.

Apologies for being so busy - a lot has happened recently like moving and getting accustomed to my new home!! I start lectures in the morning so I’m pretty excited but also nervous since it’s a new phase of my life I’ve never really experienced before. Hopefully everything will be fine and I can just enjoy the new activities etc though. Thank you all so much for your patience, I know this post is a little later than I proposed it to be but honestly this took a long time to write how I wanted it - so much to say, so little ways of articulating everything I meant.

Whilst writing this poem I listened to this playlist on loop - however ‘I Knew It, I Know You’ was probably played at least twenty times. The lyrics pretty much acted like a waking call that made me much more honest with myself about the state of my life.

Thank you so much for reading - this post broke my heart a little but it needed to happen. I need to put myself back together and find something genuine and clear. I hope that, if you relate to this poem, you take care of yourself and do the same. I’m not sure if you guys will like this one but I honestly needed to write it nonetheless.

Hoping to catch you next time! Thx for reading xoxo

Yours, Jas. ∩⑅∩