By Micki L. Bailey

Mostly, I wish I’d never met you
‘Cause then I’d never have the knowledge
That there’s someone like you out there
The person I didn’t believe could exist
The one who could steal into my private, sealed-off regions
And seemingly bond with my insides
Seemingly liaison with my depths
Seemingly grasp the complexities of my persona
Seemingly bridge for me the wide-open canyon
Between my endless depression and forbidden happiness
(Ah, remember "betterer and betterer"?)
Like no one before you had managed to achieve
And no one ever will again
‘Cause seemingly doesn’t last very long, does it?


You were my Prince Charming of Wales
My shining, adoring rescuer from pitch-black hopelessness
You freed me from chains of chronic melancholia
And gave me lots to laugh at and live for
(Ah, remember "pizza"?)
Wise enough to know better, I gave in and trusted you
I lost all of my objective eyesight and found my one true love
And wasn’t I the same for you?
Did we not cling to each other across an ocean
Out of mutual need for love and meaning in our stagnant lives?
It wasn’t only I who felt so strongly
That we were meant to be, was it?
Or was the overwhelming irony a mere coincidence?
Was our connection ever genuine at all?

I can honestly vouch for my end of the deal
I loved you. Deeply and openly. It was no secret to anyone
Along with my heart, I would have given you anything, anything
I volunteered to leave my world behind to join you in yours
I longed to care for your children
And was willing to befriend their mother
I pleaded with you to accept my financial offerings
Simply so we might be together sooner
You and I, we created dreams for "us"
Dreams that I desperately tried to make come true
But you denied, refused, and silenced me in every way
You didn’t want my help because you no longer wanted me
You were already smothering the "us" dreams to death
And I was too blindly hopeful to catch my breath

What fun we had at times, eh?
Especially in the beginning
That first nerve-bending Sunday phone-call "date"
Which lasted twice as long as we had planned
Those subsequent late-night stolen calls and whispers in the dark
The mushy, uninhibited cyber greetings which often made me weep sweetly
The transcontinental shopping excursions via our cell phones
The private chat rooms – where we felt so close and intimate thousands of miles apart
(Ah, remember the frantic "backspacing" and "um . . ."?)
The day tour of London you gave me, a city I’d dreamed of seeing
(Ah, remember the little pub where I almost left my camera?)
And how will we ever forget that show we mutually obsessed over
And the precious and infamous visits we made to the exclusive filming site?
You know we’ll never share those exquisite moments with anyone else, ever

You came into my sad existence at a time
When I was grieving two great losses
You were a savior of sorts for me
And you were searching for a major change as well
I was your guiding light too
We couldn’t believe our luck at finding each other in the chaos
It simply felt right, we both agreed, as we did so often then
But now, because I’m cursed like that
I still painfully remember everything, all the tiny details
I can’t seem to turn the storm inside off, and it tortures me, awake and asleep
I was merely the bright, shiny object which captured your attention for a time
And you carelessly, mindlessly toyed with me while it pleased you
But then the newness faded, and you rushed off to the next exciting novelty
Leaving me alone again, with all the dissolving hopes and dreams

We burned up two continents while the whole world watched, didn’t we?
And disturbed some lives in the process too, eh?
Hell, we thought, at first, the passion was hot enough
To forever soak up that big puddle that divided us
How could we know then that much smaller circumstances
Would be our end-all separator?
Should I have foreseen your immediate change of heart
As soon as you felt my company?
With all your proclamations of "forever"
How was I to predict I’d become
A mere fulfillment of your own selfish agenda?
And although I still vividly recall those "fulfillment" moments
Over here and over there (Ah, I know you remember…)
Even they grind harshly through the gashes in my memory now
If only I’d remembered then that even brief joy calls down a heavy, bitter price

Yes, it amazes even me that
Though I once loved you all-consumingly
I sometimes now feel overwhelming avenging anger for you
A white-hot hatred that, if released, would scorch the earth
You claimed to love me in return
And maybe you felt sincere at first
Maybe I felt you were sincere then too
But the bottom line is . . . you abandoned me
Forgot me, burned the bridges and left me over on the wrong side
Of the universe and of my personal canyon
Your professed "care" for me evaporated
And regrouped around the "other" one
The one you vowed to want to be done with
The one, after months and months now, you’re still legally bound to

You can’t deny that you ran to her for support many times
When you should have been running to me
You were shameless in coddling her feelings as you trampled on mine
How confusing it still is to me, the only single person in the trio
That I was the only one willing to discuss divorce
She’ll be the one to make that happen in the future, to rid herself of you
Again, you’d never muster the courage
Once I hated her, considered her my arch enemy
But now I see she was a larger victim of yours than I was
She deserves the weapons I sent her
I don’t imagine you’ll be able to squirm your way out of that little bundle
And she’ll know how to get the keenest use of them
Oddly, I now admire her wicked powers of manipulation, the ones you denied were there
Both of us were always far too good for you in every possible way

Maybe you wanted to love and be loved
On your own self-gratifying, unrealistic terms
Maybe you cruelly strung me along to pad your notorious, overactive ego
Maybe you imagined you wanted a life with me
But you weren’t strong enough to hold up your end of the connection
You lacked the psychological/emotional stamina to even nurture the "us" thing
Or to preserve your alleged feelings for me
You pulled out and walked away, true to character
Spinelessly and without even the pretense of a fight
Heartlessly and without even a hint of guilt
Cowardly and without consideration for me at all
When all I was capable of considering revolved completely around you, and nothing else
We could have had the whole nine yards, but you blew it, wasted it
Instead of a soul mate, you became a shallow, soulless monster

You broke your promise to call me on Christmas Eve
Making it the most miserable one for me to date
You left me completely alone in your house
For twelve hours on Millennium New Year’s Eve
After I’d flown over the ocean to spend it with you
You never rang to see if I made the long return flight home safely
You constantly played hurtful, ridiculous games
Like petulantly hanging up on me
Spitefully refusing to answer my calls
Arrogantly ignoring my lengthy, heartfelt email letters
Blatantly prioritizing your fans on email lists far ahead of me
And pointlessly, incessantly, pathologically lying to me
Deliberate cruelly is an unforgivable sin
And you pay for every heart you break

Oh, am I blameless in our tragic, global saga? Absolutely not
I’ve owned up to my immature ploys and devices
They’re no secret to anyone now
At least I have the dignity and self-respect which you lack
Each one of my misgivings, however, boils down to
Desperate little attempts to reconnect with you
To regain the adoration and emotional support you so freely gave me at first
And which I needed so very badly still
You had morphed into someone else after our first meeting, remember?
Even you noticed and admitted the drastic change, as did others
You tried to explain that the "real" you
Would suddenly reappear to dazzle and console me once again
As soon as you "sorted out" your everyday problems
That "real" you was only a facade and long gone forever, I now know

I can tell you what WAS real, however
The suffocating agony and crippling pain I’ve suffered and endured
Because of you
Because I trusted you and believed you
Trusted that you were a decent, affectionate person who could actually love someone
Believed that you wanted to share something meaningful with me
But you preferred to keep my heart in a blender
And spin it around at your mercy into a bloody oblivion
You would rather torment my wounded psyche over and over
And rain hell down on my depleted soul day after day
Okay, yes, I’m a drama queen, a poster child for fiery Aries
Full of passionate extremes – you’re well aware of that
But I’m not overreacting to the blackness and misery
That you alone have filled me up with

The ground opened up at my feet
The day you told me you weren’t sure if you still loved me
A huge, bottomless, deathly-cold pit that swallowed me up
For days, I wasn’t sure if I’d find the strength to crawl out
I thought I’d surely drown with my insurmountable grief
Desperately, I clutched onto every potential life-saver
In hopes of seeing the light of day again
While you nonchalantly went on with your daily routine without a thought of me
And you feign shock and hurt that I could actually
Be physical with another when I finally found myself again
After you’d brutally slammed me against a brick wall
With the ultimate, gut-wrenching, spirit-crushing rejection
That Jurassic-sized pride, your only active emotion, is all that was hurt
You self-important, superficial, egocentric, icy-hearted bastard

I was brave enough and genuine enough to share my life and soul with you
Though I’ve ruffled feathers and made enemies of some blissfully ignorant people
I’ve always been true to myself
I attempted to show you a tiny slice of real life
What it could be like if we were true to each other
But you crumbled weakly and squeezed your eyes shut
In rejection of the truth
You ran away like your green hero
You whine pathetically now that you’re mistreated and maligned
Because your true colors have shown through unattractively and embarrassingly
You deserve far worse than the pitiful "suffering" you claim
You have clue zero about bona fide suffering
But I’ll leave that up to the karma police
You can hardly run from them and from your fate

Perhaps they’ll decide that you deserve to be alone permanently
With your ever-present PC and your worshipful cyber chicks
The ones you can still charm and entertain into glowing adoration
The ones who may never get to meet the "real" you, if they’re lucky
Oh, and feel free to make me the villain in your little melodrama
I’m actually the victim – everyone agrees
But you can twist the facts around to suit your needs, as usual, if you like
Your needs were all that ever mattered to you anyway

I’m thankful to be free of you finally, back from the frightening dark side
Grateful to be a survivor, stronger and wiser
Learning to live again without sadness, loss and regret
Reinforcing my soul’s barriers in defense of another pretentious fool like you
I went under too dangerously a few times, causing my real friends to worry
But I’m back in reality now, wondering how I could let you get to me
The murmurs in my mind are increasingly faint, releasing my thoughts, freeing me

Until you learn to be honest and care for someone besides yourself
You’ll remain a miserable, clueless loser, trapped in your own silly fantasies
Just remember that lazy, non-committal slugs can slither away
From only so many wrecked lives and messes they’re responsible for
Before things catch up with them
If we truly reap what we sow, then I am very, very sorry for you

Cheers

June 25, 2000



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