Have you ever pulled a rubber band

so much that it 

stretched and it stretched until

it snapped in two?

those separate pieces of rubber

no longer together as one,

laying helplessly in your palms?

 

But you knew It would happen.

but you thought maybe, this time, 

the rubber was strong enough

to bear the stress of the separating forces. 

but as you stretch the band may slip

and all hits you

at once.

and it hurts.

It warms your skin. 

 

All the stress from the left and the right

is pulled opposing, by you and I, 

further and further.

And all the hope for a left and right 

resides in the palms of two.

 

But I was right, thinking as i held on to the left,

that I wasn’t right,

that you gave up on what’s left. 

so those separate pieces snapped 

right in two, 

and all that was left were

my warmed hands and 

all smelled of burnt rubber.