chicken parm with sweeties

people talk about that abhorrently bittersweet phenomenon, where you never really realize the last time, the last moment, you picked up and held your children in your arms. moreover, the last time you, the child, were borne.

i feel that way about you, you know. except, i started, born to you, at eighteen, and you don't really know me that well. you don't want to. and i understand that.

my day job, my choice of clothing, my habit of haircut, my partners and my parents. my friends, nervous and not to meet you. my birthday. yours, to share. all immaterial and irrelevant. invisible, i think, until you say something that reminds me that you can see me.

you can see me. i'm sorry. i wouldn't wish that upon my worst enemies.

my worst enemies wouldn't wish me upon you.

but you called me a special name. you gave me a diminutive. you thought of me, maybe, as a winsome, hopeful bit of light and quirk.

i haven't been the only one. i'm far from the most prominent.

it's nothing. i'm nothing.

but don't think i haven't noticed. the falling, of my inglorious star.

don't think it wasn't everything to me. don't think you aren't everything to me. i understand that it's an unwanted and undetected position. i think i myself might choose another, or none, if i could. it would be a smoother, safer, nobler world if i weren't burdening it, and you, with my imperative to choose.

this privilege drips through my fingers in fat, unremarkable raindrops. it's nothing to you. the thought of an instant, and not even that.

i'm not heavy, to you. i can't even make myself be. but you hold the weight of my world.

when will you love me for the last time? has it already happened?