He watched the spider as she spun her web into a ladder. Days ago he had found some spider eggs in his wardrobe and he had crushed them. Now he felt a sense of shame at robbing her of her family, the way the war had robbed him of his.

We were just two dumb kids trying to make the most of our loneliness.

We were never meant for each other. Parasites, we fed off each other's emotions and called it love. And we were both hurting inside but we couldn't let go, a disadvantage of being friends since we stopped wearing diapers.

And that's why I had to let go, had to stop replying the messages, had to stop attending parties because we had the same group of friends, had to bow my head when I saw you in church.

And now I see you with her and I wonder if you still hate me or if you've realized that I had to let go.

You are dawn

breathing life into the stifling gaze

of Nyx. I strive, yes

like Sisyphus, to be the answer to your prayer.

You are an epitome of love and wisdom,

Aphrodite, Luna and Athena

merged in one simple form.

I am your creation, joined not by blood

or flesh only but as souls interconnected.

Souls that hew and haw but stick like

the ocean and soil, like plant and water.

Far from ethereal, this world of ours,

we argue, I rebel and like God,

you strive to bring me back,

prodigal, undeserving.

Compassionate heart, it

pains you that I have to learn

by experience,

the truth I disdained in your palms.

You are an artist's special masterpiece

Wounds heal. Scars do not fade