Can We Pretend I Never Sent That?

On saying the awkward thing before it becomes the angry thing

Image by Pinterest creator @stellaesintmihiduces

Everybody says communicate, like it’s easy,

like it’s a screenshot from a podcast you just apply.

Nobody mentions the retyping.

The eleven words that could make you stay or make you leave.

It was never that I didn’t know what to say.

It’s that I knew, and I didn’t know what your face would do when you heard it.

Why didn’t you tell me?

Because I cared too much to sound needy.

Too much to be misunderstood.

So I smiled. I said I’m fine.

Called it peace, when it was just a lid on something boiling.

Then you’re screaming about dishes that were never about dishes.

They were about three weeks ago.

The joke that stayed.

Every sentence I swallowed because saying it felt scarier than carrying it.

Real communication is handing someone the map to every place they could hurt you,

and trusting they’ll set it down gently.

Relationships don’t end because the love left.

They end because two people got so good at protecting themselves

they forgot to protect each other.

Maybe it’s not about saying it perfectly.

Maybe it’s just saying the awkward thing before

it becomes the angry thing.

That stuck with me longer than I expected.

I’m not upset

I’m scared.

Those don’t make you weak. They make you understandable.

So, what’s the conversation you’ve replayed a hundred times and never had?

This poem by Dancing Elephants Press editor Gabriela Trofin-Tatár made me miss a version of life where nobody was in a hurry. I think we’re all craving a little more of that these days.

[embed]Into the Depths I Go, Into the Darling Dawn A poem of longing, love, and lifemedium.com

✍ — Published by Libby Shively McAvoy at Dancing Elephants Press. Click here for submission guidelines.