You know,

I keep getting told

that a heart growing cold

is a show of weakness

and, you know, fair.

 

Now I’m not estranged from cliche

because cold hearts are a mainstay of

angsty teen over dramatic poetry

O woe is my life after you had left me.

 

I’ve seen others describe

their own hearts filled with ice

as lifeless and dead.

I suggest that, instead

Our worth isn’t fleeting

when our chests lack the

beating

beating

beating.

 

An ice-coated heart is like glass in an action movie.

It’s only good for breaking

but it does so in spectacular fashion

because as a window

it merely passes.

 

I’ve tried being melted.

I’ve held arms so warm they physically burned

like a kid with the stove you’d think I’d ought to have learned

and, ok, fair.

but when you’re partially melted

and left completely alone

you refreeze in a shape

not entirely your own

Each half-measure healing left me feeling just

slightly

more deformed from before, and look.

 

look.

 

It’s romantic to look in your eyes

when you say you’ll be here

and I know you’re not lying

or at least, you’re not trying

but I did try a dozen times, so forgive the skepticism if you could.

 

We with frozen hearts are sworn

to take this breaking and make it an art form

look at this, look at this, I know how cold it is.

 

Trace the cracks with your fingers.

Lie to me, and feel them cut in deeper

I’ve tried to keep the lines in line

but they all just dig in steeper and-

 

what I want you to do?

 

What I want you to do, is take this baseball bat

and swing.

With everything you’ve got

in one devastating shot

shatter. me.

Break my ice heart in a thousand falling pieces

a mist amidst you

like tumbling snow

I’ll fall apart all for you

and as I do

catch the snowflakes on your tongue

Every stupid quirk, triumph and sin

feel them fall against your skin

Just give it a second

and I swear they’ll melt right in.

 

And if you don’t like the cold

that’s

you know,

fair.