“Did you love me?”
I inquired,
with red canaries  stuck in-between the gaps of my splintered teeth, in-between the remnants of our memories,
with a tongue of steel, like a double-edged knife,  like the taste of alcohol gone to waste, like the excuses we called fate,
with a voice that sounded like death,
covered in honey,
disguised as lovely.

“Because I loved you,”
I whispered,
with humble longing in the purse of my blood-stained lips, in the stolen glance of my icy eyes, in the crevices of my cracked soul,
with a tender touch, a touch that has brought even the strongest of men to their knees, begging, solemnly begging for thee,
with a quiver of hope for rebuilding,
for starting anew,
for still being with you.

“Because I still love you,”
I declared,
with the fierce, frenzy fire of dawn after the darkest night, after you swore we were doomed,
with the type of love that ceaselessly collides into us like the ocean in a rage of passion, in a fit of courage, in a tantrum of bravery,
with the regret of yesterday,
like the ghost of our past,
like a secret spoken at last.

“I still love you.”