Senseless Sun Rise

         I lay there in the sand, watching the sun rise, finishing off a blunt. Half naked, I felt so exposed and real while smoking, watching you; watching dawn break. If it were up to me we wouldn't be there, but I wasn't going to argue, I gave you so little. The sand and the lake water met, in sync and so easy. We, however, coexisted.

         Then you said to me, "It's like I've never seen one before, I mean I have, but did I ever really look?" You breathe and your face swells, your brow furrows and you stand in front of me blocking something that should have been romantic, but shit. I didn't care. Your depth left me as disgusted as it did amazed, and your beauty and wisdom made me feel broke, while at the same time saved. "Why don't I understand it?"

         I answered something about things being too big to understand, and wondered how I was the only one that had been smoking that night. You go on about theories, about apathy again. Your voice was like the cold air, but this time it was centered in me. When I dropped the roach, I couldn't blow you out anymore. My head ached.

         Still, I know I wasn't with you while dawn approached. I hadn't a clue what direction the sun actually rose and lay in what was a vat of your thoughts piling into my own head. I was mixing pieces, ripping them thread after thread until they made no sense at all, how meaningless you were still.

         "I could never feel anything as big as that, Cara. It's like I try to and never end up feeling anything at all. If I could just invest that much of myself into something, maybe it would turn me into something more, and even if it made me less at least I could be broken. I've never been broken. Nearest, I've been beat, I've been slacking, but never have I felt broken."

         You walked halfway into the lake and I knew you wanted to touch it, you wanted to feel it. The sun rising at your fingertips. It was pathetic how much the literal feeling meant to you, I could hardly bare any of it.

         I knew you wanted love from me, then. When you brought me someplace so romantic, while knowing neither of us could ever appreciate something that real, that beautiful. I let the sand scratch my back while my mind was blown as the wind from the lake and you dipped in yearning to feel the power of the sun rising.

         You wanted me to love you, although you didn't love me at all, but you wanted to love me too. Maybe you thought if we broke we could be real people and somehow we'd be caught up then and even not need each other anymore. If we could love each other maybe we could get our hearts broken.

         I smiled at you as you emerged from the water, and the sun rose too high too soon so you never got to touch it, instead your shorts were drenched in water.

         All I wanted was for you to take your wet shorts off and join me, but you were too deeply driven and I thought better of it, so I fell asleep, finally. It had been over fourty-eight hours since I'd rested even though my bed lay by itself a mile away, I slept there feeling the sand on my back as you stood by me. This time you were watching me sleep, not the sun awaken, and you were trying to love me.