Talk to me

Your body language is too quiet for me to hear
over the orange flickering of the fire.

My marshmallow melts while my desperate gaze dips and soars,
circling your blank expression,
searching, hungry for clues to wants and desires,
evidence to defend the tug in my chest.

I want so badly for you to want me.

My focus drains me.
Your silence overwhelms me.

But you’re here, where you don’t have to be.
You’re near!
you chose to be near, right?

There’s conversation around us. I hear talking, but no meaning.
I stare at my hands,
sticky sugar to pick at,
nails to clean,
palms and fingers rubbing, scratching…
do something, do anything,
just don’t look at her again.

Stop hoping for connection.
You’ve been warned not to hope.

Hope is dangerous.
Hope crosses boundaries written in shifting sand.
Hope ignores harsh words: denial, negation, dismissal.

Rejection.
And rejection hurts like a fist to the throat.

But you are here!
You are near.

Why—if not to tell me something?
To say there is still hope.
That someday,
you’ll be free
to show me love.
To touch me.
To talk to me.