When the Bell Tolls

A Poem

Photo by Garv Chaplot on Unsplash

circumstances burn
letters on the wind,
and we think we know
stories before they’re told —

but we can’t know, can we?

everyone thinks they know,
but they can’t know
(because this is a story
untold)

i wrote you letters all the time,
picking apart your indifference,
until i couldn’t figure out what
happened in the mist of long ago

(so, so, so long ago)

there are so many missives
i burned as ashes of another time —
and i thought they’d free me,
but they never did

i was always falling fast,
never into the arms
of someone who cared

and no one loves me,
no one really knows me,
and i think of how i want
everything to stand still

and i thought i could stand
at the altar of someone else’s dreams —
and i thought i could manage
someone else’s standards in bids and fits