Casa Robino

You never inspired me to write poems. Before anything, you are a friend: when we got together it did make sense to give it a try in spite of everything that separated us. I convinced you this was right. You had nothing to lose and you gave in. We learnt side by side what it was to be a couple, though I felt quite clumsy as the housewife. I taught you a few things I knew about the sacred art of lovemaking, the tasteful art of cooking. We even made a garden, and I pulled every dandelion out of it by hand, drying to roots to make my potions, harvesting the shoots every other day to make tasty salads. I gave a lot of love to your tomatoes and picked all the snails and slugs by hand to preserve it. I extracted the barbecue grill from the grass where you had left it. I brought home malvas, wild roses, nettle, chamomile, yarrow and goosefoot. You brought home the bacon, working long hours every day, and came back tired. You overfilled the refrigerator a few times because I made you taste more things, though you said you can't taste as many flavours as before. When you were tired, you'd be grumpy and sometimes go to bed immediately after eating, which made me sad and lonely, but you needed it and you had a real job, something I do not have and can't imagine having. What I liked the most bout our days together is how we learnt to be mature, to communicate our feelings. I learnt to be less controlling and overtaking. You learnt to express you limits earlier. We fought sometimes, especially when we were tired. We hated to fight in front of the CouchSurfers. We once had a fight and a reconciliation in French without really noticing.What I liked the most about our rituals was the time machine, the checking ins, the food, the movies. I liked our bike trips and I hated myself for being so annoyed when you were trying to read a map and would insist we go the other way then get lost. This is all that we were together, all that we tried in the bedroom, and the yoga postures, and the massages, and the clumsiness but it's been so long already. I changed and you changed too. I wanted a partner to face life with, to have projects, to live a longer relationship with someone, to grow better, to notice someone's path on this planet, and I came to love you deeply, a caring love like you are a little bit part of me, like I insanely need to see you happy. And while I don't feel filled by that love everyday, the few times I tried to write about it, I ended up crying. It's somehow disturbing.And nowadays I'm afraid and a bit sad because you told me having kids wasn't scary, just uninteresting. I stepped in the time machine and I couldn't see us together. I thought about the day a partner wouldn't suffice me, my nonexistent income would bother you, and I'd be bereaving a dream of a family and a pregnancy. And it comes back to me, every day and every hour as you're not online very often, while you are also in love with someone else. And I started dreaming as if it were something possible that I once meet a man who fits me better, and you find one that fits you better too, and I hope you guys never marry and have kids because I could not forgive you.It might be time to make a change. Maybe I'm just too scared of the future and I'm trying to run away, I'm not sure why all of this is such a big deal to me right now...Tell me darling what should we do now ? I'd like to believe I do not love you, but I really do now. I just believe this can't last and it tears me down to pieces.--I remember when I was leaving you a year ago - you were sick with fever and throwing up and half asleep. You asked me to play some Leonard Cohen songs and I had none. I listened to many of them for the first time that night, watching you sleep. I couldn't leave you as I should have.Here's to my humble wishes and my sweet memories.--Dance me to your beauty with a burning violinDance me through the panic 'til I'm gathered safely inLift me like an olive branch and be my homeward doveDance me to the end of love, dance me to the end of loveOh let me see your beauty when the witnesses are goneLet me feel you moving like they do in BabylonShow me slowly what I only know the limits ofOh dance me to the end of love, dance me to the end of loveDance me to the wedding now, dance me on and onDance me very tenderly and dance me very longWe're both of us beneath our love, we're both of us aboveDance me to the end of love, dance me to the end of loveDance me to the children who are asking to be bornDance me through the curtains that our kisses have outwornRaise a tent of shelter now, though every thread is tornDance me to the end of loveDance me to your beauty with a burning violinDance me through the panic till I'm gathered safely inTouch me with your naked hand or touch me with your gloveDance me to the end of love, dance me to the end of loveDance me to the end of love