what doesn’t give me butterflies (fiction writing)
when we are intimate
and a week later you put your arm around your wife
in front of me
when you tell me
I should have married my first partner
omitting that you were actually married to her
when we are intimate
and then I am told (after you undressed yourself)
I only wanted coffee
when we are intimate
and then you become a ghost
for days, weeks and months
when we are intimate
and you never once say my name
as if I don’t have one
when you close the door
using some arbitrary lie as an excuse
then open it five days later
when you engage me for work
and forget to say thank you
when I am in time and on budget
when you crawl out the woodwork
with some random conversation
as if you’d never disappeared at all
all these words and deeds and actions
do not give me butterflies in my tummy
but instead, are a knife through my heart
fight or flight?
I choose to fly away from you
back to me
Poems and Petals 