Rat King

A Poem

Here’s a secret
The most heartbreaking thing I’ve ever tried to do
Is build a fortress
Around someone else’s heart

I have seen the beautiful disaster of it
The way a friend can sing karaoke
Like a wounded bird in the dark
Off-key and full of hope
And how a part of me wants to make the music right,
To give them the harmony they deserve
But their happiness is in the brokenness
The joy in the wrong note

I have watched my lover
Put their phone on silent
To quiet a world demanding attention
A world that screams
Be with me. Be with me. BE WITH ME.
And I have wanted to build them
A house of noise-cancellation
A life so clean no one could ever
Call to tell them they’re not doing enough

Nothing breaks us more
Than trying to make life a neat-and-tidy thing
That’s how we get rat kings
Tails tangled together in a desperate pact
A sad, slow commiseration
Whispering “I’m in this with you”
When what they need is to be alone
To untangle themselves

I have spent years trying to erase
The mess from a life I didn’t live
Folding their laundry
Picking up the pieces
Trying to make their hurt less
But their life is a beautiful disaster
Mine is too
Salvation is not in trying to fix it
It’s in the mess