Heartache

Heartache is not pulsating passion it’s a dull heavy-lidded child who can’t entertain herself

who can’t focus on her homework who throws tantrums in her

too-old-for-tantrums mind

and who snaps at her parents and then can’t tell them why.

Heartache is gray or dirty beige.

Heartache sounds like a groan

or a dull chiming bell at the top of a church tower,

a gong that sounds ceaselessly.

It’s heavy heavy heavy in your limbs and your head.

It’s the reluctance to move out of bed in the morning

and the hesitancy to leave your house on Saturday night.

There’s no glossy shine or pink tinge,

there is no prince and no wedding for you.

There’s a consistently unmade bed,

a screaming teapot,

some barely-started books.

There’s a pen and paper

and there’s no warm body to take the pen and paper away,

to set them on the bedside table,

and to say,

“Let’s go to bed.”