A conversation with the body
Yearning— not for you, for her.
For the girl I once was with you. You opened something in me—someone in me. I’ve never felt that open or that seen. You stretched me, and now all I have left are the marks. The girl I became with you has slowly faded in your absence.
I don’t— I can’t— blame you. I walked away, and that’s my burden to carry. I don’t necessarily want her back, but I miss her. She’s familiar to me. So I yearn—because I don’t fully know who this new girl is supposed to be. I lie here with the acceptance that I don’t want to go back to her, because that means the pain of you comes too. I no longer want you. But in the moments you appear, and I catch a glimpse of her, I want to hold on. I want to disappear into her. But I know that version of me can only exist with you. And that is no longer a possibility. Neither is forgetting. So I vacillate between the two—between memory and becoming—until I find her.
The new her.
Me.