We met like storms—

not slowly, but all at once,

the kind of love that sets fire to bone

and makes saints of sinners.

You touched me and I unraveled,

like a shoelace pulled too tight,

finally given slack—

finally free

or maybe finally ruined.

I used to laugh at love songs.

Then you looked at me

like I was the only language

you’d ever learned to speak.

And God, I believed you.

I carved your name

into the silence behind every heartbeat,

made a home for you

in every version of forever I imagined.

But it ended

in a whisper I couldn’t understand,

your back to me,

your voice flat,

your goodbye so indistinguishable

from all the other lies

I’d convinced myself you’d never tell.

I begged—

not with pride,

but with the kind of desperation

that claws at the dirt

when it sees the coffin

being lowered into the ground.

Because you were everything.

And when you left,

it felt like dying

without the peace of actually stopping.

I screamed into mirrors,

ripped apart the bed,

searched the sheets

for any scent of you I could steal back.

I wrote poems I’d never show,

held my breath until my chest ached,

thinking maybe,

just maybe,

you’d come back

if I suffered enough.

But you didn’t.

And I kept spinning—

hair unwashed, texts unsent,

still tying and untying the same damn shoelace,

hoping the knot would bring you back.

It didn’t.

First love is a liar.

A beautiful, holy liar.

And I was the fool

who thought forever meant

you’d stay.