Between What Exists

It doesn't get any better
I used to fill in the blanks
Of your dark hole mysteries
With what I wanted to be there
But now, I don't think there's any more
To be dug out of the archeological site
That is you
Than what I see before me

I get that this is a dark time
And you're not you at your best
But that's only a partial defence
It doesn't get us in the clear
Cause it's been long enough
That we've been on this journey
And I know well enough
There's a mountain analogy
I've been grasping for
Something about lengths and heights
And the best of the best
Not being that much higher

It's not a question of being better
Or modifying constructs of behaviour
Or accepting the limitations of another
It's about whether these are the right pieces
That fit together to create something worth fighting for
Or worth living for
And with every passing day
I think that they're not

And I used to think it was me
That I was not good enough to be
With someone as socially persuasive as you
And that if I could just change
Just bend
Just learn
Just lower my voice enough
Just lose opinion enough
Just be on time
Enough
That it would work

But what I'm learning
Slowly, painfully
Is that I don't need to be those things.
Because I am in fact, to my great surprise, capable.
The astonishing nature of the revelation
Is disturbing unto itself
There has been a terrible unearthing
Of a terrible truth:
I gave up myself
For you
And I shouldn't have

At the end of this road
Is a painful
Treacherous sacrifice
But no matter how long
I dance around that conclusion
The silent truth remains
That you think that what you want is me
But like every man before you
I know that you don't
Not really
Not me
Just some hologram illusion.

And is spending the expanse
Of each day like this
Knowing that the machine only runs
At the expense of myself
How I want the equation of my life
To end up?
That I have the option of considering
What I would even want for my own life
Is itself astonishing
Cause I always just survived to survive
The answers such questions
And even the asking
Leave me troubled
So I toss and turn
You whisper sweet things in the darkness
And it only makes me sad
If they're true
Because the expansive disconnect
Is only getting larger