An Emergency Room Visit
When you go into an emergency room they always ask you a series of questions.
Describe your pain.
Rate it one a scale of 1 to 10.
What do you think caused the pain.
You would think that after years of working with the public, nurses and doctors wouldn't ever be shocked by the words spilling from someone's mouth in between coughing up blood to answer,
but somehow you made me the exception to that.
When the nurse asked me to describe my pain I just stared blankly at her
I opened my mouth but I couldn't say it.
I didn't know how to tell her my chest felt like it had been shot by a thousand arrows
As if it had been scratched so deeply beneath the surface that I couldn't breathe.
I couldn't put into words
The way the flowers you had planted in my lungs so many months ago
were withering
begging for water
that wasn't tainted with my own tears
without seeming insane.
How do you even begin to explain to someone
that the veins connecting your heart to the rest of your body
are so filled with memories of someone's words
that you can't bear the weight of them long enough to move.
I finally settled on telling her it felt like I was drowning.
Like I couldn't breathe to the point that my body was convulsing within itself
and calling out your name.
After struggling to regain her sense of balance in the room, I was asked to rate it on a scale of 1 to 10.
Rate this feeling of lifelessness and all emotions at the same time
on a scale of 1 to 10.
I wanted to say 10.
God, did I want to say 10.
But it isn't the absence of your arms that hurt, it's the memories of how they felt
The what if's of how it would've felt had you stayed.
I settled on saying 7.
The pain of your words ripped me apart in every way imaginable
Yet it didn't even begin to compare to the nightmares I would soon be having
So how could I possibly tell her it was a 10 already.
If it was already a 10
there would be no room left for me to look at the pictures of you smiling
and feel the world in my stomach.
She left after that.
She didn't get to ask what was causing the pain.
I didn't get to tell her that the cause of death was your words
I didn't get to show her the bruises around my neck from your broken promises.
Let alone had i lifted up my shirt to show the insides of my heart, or lack thereof, to reveal the puddles of love falling into my soul and settling at the bottom of my lungs
Causing me to cough up blood stained with your name.
I didn't get to explain any of this to them because although I tried,
No one can ever seem to wrap their mind around my love for you
And your total lack of love for me.