I don't own you; you don't owe me; but I may as well admit, you've hurt me. Six months on, and I've just about worked up the strength to pry open the door to the tomb, and stare at the outside world. And the first sight I see is your beaming smile, one which I have to painfully mimic as you tell me the big news: you've met someone, and this time it's serious.

Was I the more loving, or just the more foolish one? I gave you everything -- the only thing -- I had: an earnest heart, which was filled only with the thought that you were its one rightful captor. I can accept that circumstance meant that could not be. But I am surprised you could go hunting again so soon.

Of course I hope you find happiness, and all my prayers are with you. But would that for once, someone pray for the phantom who now retreats back into his cell. Even if the chance at equal affection has passed, a drop of compassion goes a long way in the dungeons.

Winter's harsh enough without us having to force our hearts frozen shut. The sky is an oppressive grey, and the sun is many hours away from even considering an appearance. Tucked away in my quilt, I feel warm in body but utterly chilled everywhere else. It will be some time yet before the images of you start to thaw. Sometimes, it seems easier to just go back to sleep, in hopes of a dream of pitch black.

I keep thinking that there must be some better way of playing this game, and that surely there is a happy medium than the callous isolation that I have found myself left in. But, I'm willing to accept that there is much I don't know about these matters. Whatever the case may be, it's clear enough that the state I'm in simply can't continue. Where exactly does that leave me? I know standard response is to try and move on. I just can't imagine staring into another set of eyes, though. Not now, and not for a while yet. Which might have been alright ten years ago, but time is another ally I found a way to betray.

I'm willing to accept that situations like this aren't anyone's fault in particular. It is however only natural to ask why I seem to find myself on the receiving end of so many failures. If, for sake of argument, there is some arbiter that chooses not to intervene, but rather attempts to educate us through our mistakes, I would simply implore them to consider the possibility that some people are beyond learning. It's not as though I don't have all the information in front of me, the cold facts as to the choices I made that left me shipwrecked. I think I can even put together the puzzle pieces. It's just that I don't want to acknowledge the picture I then see.

I'm almost entombed here, amongst boxes, papers, and other scraps of the past that simply will not let me go. Having lost her convincingly, it's hard not to look back at the last four years as some kind of failure. Not so much professionally -- though of course there is plenty of room for that interpretation -- than in terms of actual emotional progress, where I can't point to anything meaningful.

Having successfully pushed myself away from everyone who ever had a kind thought about me, my days are spent hiding away from the outside world, and myself. There is a desperation in my attempts to fill up the never ending hours that offer themselves, where all of life's treats and mysteries are available, but seem profoundly empty as I think of partaking them just by myself. I don't know the exact moment where I cut off the last healthy friendship, but it was long enough ago that now even the suggestion of an outing is enough to get me through the week.

Oh, I will admit it -- she still occupies my mind far more than is healthy or helpful. I still can't quite figure out what lesson I'm supposed to take away from the whole experience. While I'm more than happy to flagellate myself for my many failings, on this particular occasion, I'm not sure I'd done anything so profoundly evil as to deserve being so cruelly denied an opportunity of happiness. I replay several key moments again and again, perhaps in hopes that through some sorcery I might go back to those times. And when on occasion she leaves me a short note, or just otherwise lets me know that I'm not completely out of her life, I have to work hard to suppress those giddy feelings of hope, that perhaps this is the restart that I've been spending all my idle hours conjuring. But, curled up in a cold room, speaking these words that she will never read, it's all too clear that this is just more fantasy. And I don't know what to do about it.

I know that this life cannot be sustained. I've had many hours of joy in this particular corner of the world, and on balance, it's probably the best place I've ever lived. But -- and I don't know this is a self fulfilling prophecy -- all things have their time. The last few months, my daily routine has been nothing short of shambolic. With no alarm to guide me, or introduce any source of rigour in my life, I sluggishly toss off the sheets only when I feel like it. And I very rarely feel like it at anything approaching a normal work day time.

Shattering though the isolation is in the office, it's nothing compared to what awaits me as I may be slow trudge home, my only companion the dull streetlights and the occasional junkie. I used to try to make a point of not staying too late as a habit, not unless there was something particularly important to be done. But now I either invent things to do, or simply find creative ways of killing time, just so that I don't have to face that horrid question: how do I go about unwinding? Ordinarily, this wouldn't be a particular problem. My many solitary interests are still very much in effect, even if some require a certain rekindling. But there has been an alarming trend towards them being the absolute only thing that governs my life.

Put plainly, I simply don't go out anymore; Because I have no one to go out with. In part this is a statement about the peculiarities of my workplace, but that also suggests a key flaw and how I try to forge friendships here. Maybe this is all part of adult life, or at least, adult life when you're entirely on your own. I know, this is the life I've chosen. But I didn't appreciate the things that made it bearable.

So, fine, you might say, then figure out a way of changing that situation. But I can't think of anything that doesn't require a massive purging of whatever few things I have set up as pillars that define me. My career, for example. Despite all my misgivings about it, I suppose my actions speak for themselves, and that I have chosen it over life.

I bid goodbye
With best regards
And hopes our paths
May cross;

Empty words
To serve as shield
For a heart forever
Lost.

The Pretender

I run into a colleague while making my way to the stairs -- this will be the fourth time in the day that I've had the overpowering need to leave the office, and perhaps the planet -- and realise that his banal chit-chat no longer bores me, but rather actively hurts me. I put on a smile with no care for how obviously fake it is, and stare blankly at his moving lips. My vision is blurry, my hearing warbled; all my energy is taken up by my mind, as it tries its hardest to think of anything but her.

A lifetime spent in careful dissection of song finally has some value, at least -- I know just the people to turn to, the phrases to wait for and experience with an age of experience since last they crossed they mind. They do help, and remind me at least art's good for something. At the same time, even this act has a touch of the unreal, and I find myself questioning just how deeply the composers mean what is being sung. After all, it seems that to the world at large, it's just something that goes on in the background, to be discarded and forgotten when life resumes its natural course. Not for me; for me, I know that the closest I will get to life is listening to other people sing about theirs.

I'm not sure what exactly I'm supposed to do from here. Even if it never really began, it's certainly over, so that chapter is closed. But what comes next? When I think of the vast expanse of time that now welcomes me, all I see is emptiness. And yes, I've long thought that I would walk those plains alone. But given a glimpse at another path, only to have it snatched away again? Even for me, that seems too cruel.

It's not very becoming to admit to feeling this way, at least, not when removed from the immediate aftermath. I'm told that I'm supposed to shake off these feelings, and remind myself of the mythical fish that live in the sea I've never seen for myself. Looking back at the mess I've made of these intimate interactions, though, I can't quite imagine there being another one. Yes, I said that last time, and the time before. But I was younger then, and still had reasons to hope.

She offered me a hand, and in a moment of disbelief and delusion, I thought I might reach to hold it. But now things are in their right place again: as I reached for that elusive grip, she backed away and let my fingers feel the cold air of nothing. Back to where I began; fallen, in a pit, no light in sight. My friend tells me, it's all my fault, that I shouldn't have hesitated the way I did. That may be, I say, but why fault something if it leads to a state of right? I close my eyes and accept that the touch will belong to someone else. I am left instead to grab at the air, slowly getting the sense that my hands themselves are softly disintegrating. Perhaps when I am no longer solid, the air and I will have a chance to make it through together.

There will be no more chances. Three is enough for any lifetime. It took a certain ingenuity to throw each of them away so casually, and with no apparent concern for my future. My future! I suppose that's a more optimistic way of speaking about the void that beckons, one which started in my mind and now has spread to where I once had a heart.

I've missed this; the familiar sense of my fingers finding synchronicity with my mind, as they help trace out a thought that's hiding just outside the horizon of consciousness. For a moment, I'm released from the dull rut of existence, and I focus everything on the goal of sculpting the words into perfection. They're dedicated to someone important, who will know if I have let my standards slip; assuming, that is, that theirs haven't either. I measure each adjective carefully, knowing it's best not to overstate or overpower; the mandatory joke is similarly desiccated to my taste, and placed delicately at the tip of the opening para. When it's done, I look at the result, and for once have to admit that not everything I do is completely trite; it's a perfect capsule of my life, a blend of the hazy present and vivid past that startles even me in its lucidity. I have to sigh in disappointment that I can't just call it a day here and cruise along. In these words, I have found a home that will not refuse me. Would that they helped invite someone else to move in as well.

 I'm clinging on desperately to every smile, every laugh, every acknowledgement that I exist in some form of positive light. My nights are spent in careful dissection of the day's events, as I try to come to the conclusion I want to hear: that this could be something. But when I get the opportunities that I spend all weeks trying to create, I'm left crippled by a cold dose of reality. I see snatches of an actual life being lived, with friends and hobbies and a general sense of purpose. What is it that I have to offer in addition to this rich world? Perhaps when I can answer that question, I might have more luck. But somehow I think it's going to be a while.

Retrovertigo

Something is trying to find me, but my mind doesn't let it in. I've sheltered it now for the last few months with all manner of work, thought, and really anything else I can find that will help create some fortification. Now that I find myself without any excuses to fall back on, I can sense this stranger approaching again. It is trying to tell me something true, something I should probably hear; but even before it speaks, I know I'm not going to be able to handle it.

Looking ahead, it seems I have a couple of choices. One is to keep building my wall, and embrace a life that is lived running away from something. The other has the nobler sound to it: confronting what it is I fear, and in the process coming to some great realisation about myself. But am I being too cynical when I say that all may just be too late? You tell me what I'm supposed to look forward to. You tell me where it is I'm suddenly going to find my purpose. The time for all that has passed; in whatever time I have left, am I not better off spending it doing something productive? And so what if that life makes me unhappy? It's not like the alternative is any better.

This hit the spot.

“Having made an utter failure of my life, one day I found myself in the midst of my poverty and wretchedness, thinking about the female companions of my youth. As I went over them in my mind’s eye one by one it suddenly came over me that those slips of girls – which is all they were then – were in every way, both morally and intellectually, superior to the ‘grave and moustachioed signor’ I am now supposed to have become. The realisation brought with it an overpowering sense of shame … And I resolved then, however unsightly my shortcomings might be, I must not, for the sake of keeping them hid, allow those wonderful girls to pass into oblivion without a memorial.”