Breaking up is hard to do

we are new
like a crisp pillow sham
like an apple (still stemmed)
like the unbroken filament of a light bulb.

we are over
like a curtain-close bow
like an arrow’s quivering tail
like the very end of a jungle vine.

this is pain
like a size-too-small shoe
like an underwater breath
like the sting of crushed bleeding lips.

as this fades
as the heavy stomach pain fades
you feel the numbing kiss
of Apathy.

She mends you
you welcome Her
like a flood soothes
the scorching desert

and you are strong
like a fallen tree—now immovable in the soil
like an old patch of scarred skin
like the thick membrane tissue of your broken beating heart.