I once thought I had everything in my hands
Looking at the perfectly carved face in front of me
I thought to myself
I made this
And it is lovely
And then those perfectly chiseled features
Slipped through my hands
Shattering around my feet
While I sunk to my knees
I picked up the shards
Hands shaking
Fingers bleeding
I held the tiny pieces close
Not willing to let them go
I swept them into a tiny box
Lined with silk and down-feathers
Plucked from my own soul
I sealed the lid

When the days are cold
And the cards all fold
And the saints we see
Are all made of gold
The year that I turned 19 was the darkest year of my life. Not the hardest; the darkest. I was still reeling from my breakup the previous year, and I was stuck in a deep slough of murky depression. The fog was so thick that on most days I felt like I was suffocating. Drowning, even.
When your dreams all fail
And the ones we hail
Are the worst of all
And the blood’s run stale

"Tis better to have loved and lost / than never to have loved at all".
-from the poem "In Memoriam" by Lord Alfred Tennyson
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A heart is not a thing
To be put in a box
(Close the lid with a clang
Pretend love as one talks)
In order to gain
A “pure”, dried up box of rocks.