and thus,

confusion, although not really.

i knew:
you were hardly there
(at the best of times).

and NEVER held it against you.

i knew:
that your love of me was SUCH
(much like my own, i now ESPECIALLY
realize) that i could only make you
care about yourself by making you

take care of me...

i knew:
i was in your heart as much
as you could
bear
(grizzlies?

being nothing less
than violently devoured by it/me
before you could really
'take as much
as you could';

nothing short of
dancing
on the REAL brink of
extinction
could provide sufficient contrast)....

i knew:
you knew
(waiting?
NOT.NOT.NOT.)
the ways i which i wasn't/didn't/never was...

yet

the maudlin pop song, still
(as so often)
says what neither of us
ever would have,
yet
we felt so much exactly
THAT

but i didn't know:
the ways in which your realization
of me
would eclipse
so much else.

the way
your 'little smile'
would be the greatest acknowledgment
i'd ever felt
(or maybe shall)

the way you
(or maybe EVERYONE)
will have to be staring
LITERAL

death

in the face
(over and over and, as usual,
happily, hilariously,
making fools of
the 'prognosticators')
to realize

what i'd/ve offered,

still do,

and the stakes:

that for me
are always

there

the same:

everything.