"String Theory for the Unrequited"

3 months ago 13 notes poetry unrequited love string theory writing

“String Theory for the Unrequited”

In this world I take the turn too fast,
& in another I am reduced to dust.
A different life where I am wet hair running late to work, not fried nerves running from it.

In this world I take the turn too fast,
& in two others I am reduced to dust.
In one life, I am a mother, twin pigtails wrapped in ribbon, caked in mud.
In the other, I am a builder; a man with hands made for holding hips and high rises,
scraping sky one fist full at a time.

In this world I take the turn too fast,
& in three others I am reduced to dust
In the first of those lives, I am a brunette, bashful and brittle instead of blonde and bombastic.
In the second, I paint skin instead of pages.
And in the third, I am yours.

In this life I take the turn too fast, and there are others yet where I have not been and may never be, & then there are

some still where I have 3 arms,
2 heads, and
no heart for my two heads to fight with
no you for my three arms to long for.

But in .00015% of the worlds where we exist, we are meeting right now…
…or now…

and we can feel our fates churning and urging us in all of the directions we could be.

2000 mes and yous dancing around the yous and mes this world would never let us be.
Wondering in which iteration I am happy.

In three of them, I never met your gaze from across the garden.
In thirty, our hands brushed only briefly before the forces of fate pulled them apart like our opposing poles.
And in three hundred of our lives, I never loved you,

but in three thousand, I am writing you this poem.

In this life I took your hand too fast,
& in two million others I am reduced to dust.
Twenty where I never tried to fill your absence with my thoughts of string theory
Two where you never left amidst a smoke bomb of anger and self-defeat &
One
where we are sharing our soft stories over strong whiskey.

I have seen all of our worlds, & in at least half of them,
we are beautiful.

In this life I take the turn too fast, and in all others you reduce me to ash.