Heartbreak on top of heartbreak,
and to not even fully know what
a heart breaking really means.

Is it nagging, never-ending, mental suffering, or loss,
like a vital part of your sense of self amputated,
like growing used to a stump,
after knowing the glorious crowned height
of a straight growing tree, or stupidity, ego,
stories and fantasies that get woven haphazard
together when the nights grow unexpected cold.

Did I make up this concept of brokenhearted?
Did I harbor an expectation of hope being repurposed into happiness?
Did I climb to full height on a ladder, because if so, I chose this.
And I am the source of this antagonistic sensation. Falling.
All the pulsating, stomach clamping, nauseating emotions.

Yet the crow caws through the stiff shoulders of thermals.
The littler ones whistle short and simpler.
The goddamned sun has not been shy in over a week.
Summer is slowly breaking open into autumn.
Cooler air has swept back and reclaimed the evenings.
Damp capes of ignorant dew decorate the tired realm of morning.

Paradise is in control. Conquered. All around me.
Yet within it, my delicate heart is straining. All but breaking.
Again. And the word and. Again.
And it hurts.
I don’t fully know what it means, just this feeling.
Which honestly, has me reeling.
Drawing being drawn back up
out of this beautiful, warm,
midseptember scene.

Where I doubt it would change anything,
to know what heartbreak really means.