Yoana Tosheva: I Did Not Love You

Photo: Joanna C. Valente

Still a precarious position

There was a time I believed I did not love you –

I believed I could do that.

A simple choice, like throwing out the cigarettes.

*

I had a dream that my brother died, and we were crying, and it was only you and me.

I had a dream that we promised to try harder, and nothing changed.

I had a dream, and you weren’t in it.

*

Sometimes I catch myself wanting to call you just to talk, so I talk myself out of it.

That’s what happens when you’re proven wrong (right) enough times. 

That’s what happens when you learn your lesson, I’m finding.

*

Last winter, when you hurt your back and couldn’t walk, you looked so small –

like someone else’s child, which I forget you are. 

Who could blame me?

*

There is no ceremony:

when I spark the lighter or the rings on my fingers click, I see you in flashes.

I know I cannot untangle you from me;

I know I am still a thing you had a hand in shaping.

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Yoana Tosheva is a student, an immigrant, and an artist. Her work has been published in Diminuendo, Wack Mag, Anser Journal, Sixty Inches From Center, Trampoline and elsewhere. She runs a blog about music which you may peruse at https://collectivecadence.home.blog/. Her visual art can be found on Instagram @yoana_art.