Farewell Sestina

[gryphons_quill]

I loved you far too much and far too well
and now I don't know how to let you go;
still, I wouldn't keep you if I could,
for you deserve a better love than me.
Yet even as I live my life alone,
I crave your slightest touch, a single word.

Not long ago, you left me many words,
which, though I tried, I understood not well;
I only knew that I was left alone,
to stand, and then to fall, watching you go
away from our tiny home, away from me--
no words explaining how you ever could.

I never thought of leaving, never could.
I thought that we were bound by more than words,
so, when you turned and took your love from me
I'm afraid I didn't take it very well.
I was afraid that once I let you go
I would spend the rest of my life alone.

You once told me I'd never be alone,
that, with your love to hold me, I never could,
and so I never feared that you would go.
But some cold wind has scattered all your words,
the pretty vows of love you spoke so well--
that you still speak, but no longer to me.

Now the world seems dark and cold to me.
My fears and shadows won't leave me alone.
If I could just believe you loved me well
I'd bid my ghosts goodbye--perhaps I could!
--but then I know these thoughts are only words
and have no strength to make my nightmares go.

I will have to learn to let you go
and still believe that once you cared for me,
that when you said "forever" you meant the word,
but now it's time for me to be alone.
You cannot love me now, but once you could,
and in that time you loved me very well.

If you would say a single word to me,
I'd go to you as quickly as I could.
As well you don't.  I need to be alone.