I Know You

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I know you
More than you may think
The you that plays hide and seek with the light
The person you are when not typing,
Never revealed by your fingertips.
When your screen goes dark
And the lights go out in your room
Do you really think I don’t see
The scared little girl
That lives within sometimes?
How much you want to scream
To make it all go away
Make it all just fucking go away.

I hold my silence often,
Perhaps too often.
"Don’t analyze
Don’t push her away",
I reason.
"Just listen.
Be there, but don't smother."
And so I keep this distance
And it kills me
As much as what burns inside does you.

I hear the thoughts that fill your mind,
The fear, the doubt, the uncertainty.
You who pray for peace and tranquility
Yet curse its very presence
Longing for those you love to return
And fill your silent rooms with cries and laughter.
You think I don’t know
How thoughts of this consume you?
So many unanswered questions asked
Of yourself,
Of this life.
A life that once seemed would be so perfect
But still can be.

I know what you ache for
Breathe for,
Would kill for.
Thoughts you have of him
Irresistible, unattainable
But not impossible.
I feel you,
Your deepest fears and desires most unsettling
That would threaten to unhinge you
Were they not so delicious.
The thoughts you have of her,
The one you meet in your dreams
In ways you’ll never articulate because, well,
It’s something good girls just don’t do.

You think I don’t
But I know.
It lives in the spaces between your words,
Those you share with others
Or with me in quieter moments.
Like a Koontz novel you’re mysterious
Yet infinitely readable.
And although I can’t predict your ending
Your words unspoken
Reveal all.