back and forth

you were like a wave - coming and withdrawing and coming again and i guess for a while i was happy to be the place you come back to, the destination, the thing you reach before you disappear. i guess for a while it felt good to be immersed in something so vast, even if for scattered moments. i guess for a while you leaving and me being left didn’t matter, or maybe it felt like a price worth paying, the sacrifice you offer gods in exchange for unearthly love. for a while. but see, somewhere along the line the waiting hardened me and the distance made you the enemy and you stopped kissing me gently and touching me softly and you started breaking against me, breaking me, breaking. and still - i stayed, i was the place, the safe haven, the one you come back to. and still. and then you left and left and again and again and at one point it felt like i was either being broken or trying to heal and there was no time in between, no peace. and at one point the price seemed to steep and the love too thin. and at one point i looked out at the sea and thought this is what i want to be. and at one point i became. and at one point i left. you might come back, but i won’t be there. not this time, not again. i might run into you in the ocean, or maybe one day when we are both rain, or perhaps once when we are both nourishing a flower. maybe. but it will be brief, because darling i no longer stay still.