I began wearing my Heart on a bracelet,
just to see if I could conjure some comfort from the way it smiled up at me,
bruised and abused but still sharing a hopeful smile,
and so, I smiled back,
not really meaning it,
but meaning to be polite.

I drove past the House of a lost lover this morning,
looking down at my little heart with apprehension,
anticipating a storm on my wrist,
but in its place that morning was a smile,
something simple that said “the mourning is over”,
and we passed the palace of my teenage passion without incident,
finally able to call her my lover,
and able to accept that like all things,
it got away from me, and the world carried on.

There was a time when the house would levitate at the very thought of a kiss,
walls collapsing and crumbling as she took me in her arms,
and yet,
the house remains,
not a dishevelled disaster that couldn’t contain our affections,
not a haunted, hollowed out nightmare that I must fear,
just a simple, sweet looking house,
and the kiss,
shared between confused kids is just a memory,
something that no longer frightens me.

My heart is heavy,
but only because she is full of the things I tried to forget.
She held onto them,
braver than I,
smarter than I,
because she knew that one day,
I would be ready to see them again.