On the Inside

that night I told you to be careful
in the way I could not be careful myself.
you left the party and I walked from drink to drink
wishing the best for you, knowing it was the worst for me.

it is a horrible wonderful thing to be in love with you.
to get to hear you sing for hour after hour
but never be the subject of the song.
to listen and listen and listen.

I carry your equipment to gigs.
I am your ride home, your calendar.
I let you choose the radio station, the time.
and in return, yours is the only goodnight I ever need.

I’ve lost track of where friendship ends and falling begins.
(this is the foolish refrain of the hopelessly devoted.)
there are times I want to kiss you midsentence.
undo the not-doing with one gesture.

but I hesitate in the wondering.
she’s taken the place that was never mine.
you and i have our sad misdirected love in common.
only yours sings out, while mine is a voice left on the inside.

I bide my time, pick at the petals, play the good best friend.
you ask me what I’m looking for, and I outline you.
you don’t recognize the shape, offer other names.
you say my time will come, and I hope.

I know this is how the world works.
it would be funny, if it wasn’t my heart.
she is the weakness you think of as strength.
while I am the strength you have no idea is there.

I am the one who knows who you are.
I want you to be happy.
and you could be
with me.

I have gone out, a possessed witch,
haunting the black air, braver at night;
dreaming evil, I have done my hitch
over the plain houses, light by light:
lonely thing, twelve-fingered, out of mind.
A woman like that is not a woman, quite.
I have been her kind.

I have found the warm caves in the woods,
filled them with skillets, carvings, shelves,
closets, silks, innumerable goods;
fixed the suppers for the worms and the elves:
whining, rearranging the disaligned.
A woman like that is misunderstood.
I have been her kind.

I have ridden in your cart, driver,
waved my nude arms at villages going by,
learning the last bright routes, survivor
where your flames still bite my thigh
and my ribs crack where your wheels wind.
A woman like that is not ashamed to die.
I have been her kind.