Withdrawal

I hoped you would be here,
but could not have known, toying with odds and percentages like a gambler
with his house and car keys ready to become chips.
I tried to look nice but ended up in shorts and sandals in the interest of comfort and the chances of boredom.
I turned to the sound of the door expecting to be let down,
to instead recognize your brightly colored tee
and recently cut hair walking like scrambled parts of a word I cannot properly pronounce.
I whimpered under my breath and buried my face in my hands
like I did not want you to be there,
but really I was just praying to not be embarrassed,
asked to speak or participate in any demonstration
or expected to focus on anything more then the back of your head
while I fidget and fret just inches from your heart shaped earrings and peripheral vision.

Roles reverse as the focal point of the room moves.
Now I am in the front and you can watch me without any qualm,
which occurs to me in an uncomfortable sense of karma I feel from behind.
So, I turn to check my paranoia and feed denied voyeurism
to find your eyes fixed on mine as if dreaming, but why?
Was it curiosity forming or just you returning the favor like an unwelcome gift?
In any case, I looked immediately away and felt like my face was on fire,
afraid to return to your direction like a store I had shoplifted from.
I felt my throat close and could not breath properly until all the attention in the room shifted back to the speaker where he started.
I watched your body turn away from me and could suddenly exhale
as if I had been underwater.

In that two hour training, I felt both trapped and incredibly blessed.
You frequently combed the back of your hair with your hands and fingernails
as if you were afraid it was too short
and I wanted so badly to be reassuring.
To move up my seat and whisper, “Nothing in this world you change about yourself
could ever subtract an ounce of beauty from that face.”
But it would have been inappropriate and weird,
so I just sat there, humored
at the thought of you being the least bit self conscious
when you are so fucking beautiful I should have to pay
for every time that I look
like service negotiated from passenger seats.

To me, your face is heroin or LSD.
It’s not the gateway drug, but the ultimate high.
When I see you, it’s good.
It’s a happy pill I can swallow without water,
a head rush that won’t keep me from driving or reporting to work.
There is nothing like this feeling that can be replicated without you being there
like a main ingredient, the central piece.
You are it, my weakness, my vice, my peculiar fetish
I could never explain like an acquired taste that could eventually be shared.

What I hate, is what comes after,
like a cruel repossession so close to payday.
I have these days like a lottery won, like Christmas observed,
then weeks of nothing.
I expect to see you, then don’t.
I see you driving or we speak briefly, but it’s all work.
I want to get personal, up close, only to fall short.
You are so far away in a sense, but I am so drawn to you
I think it’s got to mean something, but then it doesn’t.

I can’t lie
and say that I’ve never felt this way before
because really……there’s always someone.
But, I’ve never seen anything through.
I’ve been cautious and always, always had an exit strategy
like a fire drill.
But this job means too much for me to leave
and something about you is different than anything else I’ve ever been strung out on
like an unnamed narcotic that cannot be restricted.
Around you, my heart feels overworked and all my nerves spasm.
I imagine my pupils dilated and feel all the blood in my body rush to my face,
my arms are weightless and always out of place, my legs are heavy and ready to buckle
as if willing to beg.
Why anybody would chase these feelings like a desired effect
is beyond me but not really lost.
I would be a hypocrite to say otherwise, to suggest I have been without fault.
After all, I am an addict
and when you’re not around, for however long
what I feel, is nothing short of withdrawal.