The unbearable weight of staying

I don’t know when love became elusive
What I know, is that no one I know has it.

My father's arms around my mother's neck,
Fruit too ripe to eat, a door half way open.
When your name is a just a hand I can never hold,
everything I have ever believed in, becomes magic.

I think of lovers as trees, growing to and
from one another, searching for the same light.
My mother's laughter in a dark room,
a photograph greying under my touch.
This is all I know how to do, carry loss around until
I begin to resemble every bad memory,
every terrible fear,
every nightmare anyone has ever had.

I ask, did you ever love me?
You say of course, of course so quickly
that you sound like someone else
I ask are you made of steel? are you made of iron?
You cry on the phone, my stomach hurts

I let you leave, I need someone who knows how to stay.