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For You Bonnie

We bathed in luxury, earned by way of gambling and sweat, long days at sea and long nights on the felt. The mountains, shrouded in shadow and swallowing darkness, formed an imposing backdrop. Two outlaws on the run from the rules of life and the laws of creeping time, we drowned our hesitancy with emerging love and imbibed long lost innocence until we collapsed in each other's arms in a drunken stupor. We laughed defiantly in the face of rationality, stretching each moment into an eternity. Each passing day became a monument to our devotion, every steamy, raw session of carnal lovemaking a sacrifice at the altar of our love. Bonnie and Clyde.

The news trickled over me at a leisurely pace initially. Raindrops from Heaven, dotting my cheeks like freckles, revealed themselves to be tears shed from my own glossed over eyes. The specks of water grew sharper with each passing second, the realization entering them and changing their consistency. Anger gave them blades, slicing me deeply, and sorrow poured acid into every open wound. Thin walls gave a voyeuristic medium to my grief, so I buried my distraught face in my pillow. And I screamed. I shouted to the Heavens, imploring God as to why he would bring you into my life at such an inopportune crossroads. I wailed like a broken adolescent, shrieking with all the wayward emotion I could muster. But, at the end of it all, I sat in contemplative silence. I felt betrayed, beleaguered, and infernal. Yet, the storm had passed, and lounging in its eye, I knew peace. A sort of acceptance washed over me, an intrinsic understanding. I couldnt be mad at you, and I never will be. Despite what youd done to drive me to leave, it was still my decision to do so. You merely did what we said we would both do. It would be stupifyingly ignorant for me to harbor ill will towards you when you did exactly what we both said we would. Your guilt proves your love, and that exonerates you from any unearned malice borne of my fatigued heart. I love you, and I always will. You are forgiven.

You always said that you preferred my prose to my poetry. I never took any offense, but I couldn't help but wonder why. Eventually, after broaching the subject, you told me sweetly that it was a matter of clarity. In my regular writing, you said, my feelings, emotions and motivations were on plain display. There was no dressage or unnecessary verbosity needed to enhance the meaning of my message. It simply was. Everything else was enhancing detail drawing attention to the main stage. With my poetry, however, further gazing into the well was required. You did love it, you assured me, but would rather enjoy the warmth of my expression head on, not slice your way through a jungle of metaphor and lyricism, machete in hand, to get to the core of the piece. And I respect that. Earlier today, while writing another poem about you, the words stuck. They flowed normally in the technical sense, but, like a ship veering stubbornly and discernably off course, the point of it all became mired behind the mechanics of rhyming, despite my best efforts to the contrary. That's my problem with rhyming in general. Many would say that poetry is the form of writing I excel at most, and Im inclined to agree. But after awhile, no matter how skilled of a wordsmith you become, bending, shaping, altering and conforming words to your will through the alchemy of ability, you run into a roadblock. Whether the focus is 2 lines or 20, you will inevitably encounter a situation where the word you painstakingly plucked from your lexicon to place at the end of your multisyllabic masterpiece isnt compatible with any of its brothers. You will be forced to rewrite everything, simply because of this hard fact of the English language. And that's alright. Ive written enough unpublished lyrics about you and I to fill volumes. Ive proven myself on this front grandly. Yet pieces like this cut through the banners and details straight to the heart and love. To the soul, like an outlaw's bullet.

What could I say to you that hasnt already been said? The repitition of my voice, glazing over the same sentences half-heartedly was nauseating. We both apologized too much and nowhere near enough. Multiple times daily Im forced to stop, breathe deeply, and begin a mental onslaught against rogue thoughts, the first constituents of my treasonous OCD attempting to stage a coup against my rationality for ownership of my peace of mind. Nevertheless, when the tears come, they fall freely. I relive every moment spent with you vividly and graciously, relishing the play by play in my head with a synesthete's immersion. Long nights spent chasing the yellow line to some Old West town, two outlaws chasing the ghost's of an era long passed, wrenching vitality from the stars themselves, the Moon blessing us in holy matrimony everytime it rose. Early morning reprieves at truckstop diners, discussing life and the world over towering monuments of pancakes and greasy saturated fat laden dishes. You always said my diet would kill me. The same life I would imagine and fantasize about as a teenager, trapped in the bondage of high school I lived for real as a Man trapped in the bondage of service. This is why I fell for you and why I loved you then, love you now, and will love you always, regardless of what youve done. Where other women occupied some immaterial place at my side, an addition to my life, you simply fit, the reunification of something missing. There was no effort needed aside from the indulgent effort of courtship and seduction, of unraveling your mysteries and discovering your secrets. You didnt accompany me through the fantasy, you were a part of the fantasy from its inception, an integral, indispensable piece. As I said before, we never tried, we just were. It was all so easy.

I love you baby, and I always will. I know youre reading this. We both have seperate lives now, but were forever linked. I am always here for you, regardless of what youve done during our split. Feel no guilt, because I feel no anger. We'll ride again, God willing and with your permission. I love you Bonnie.

 -Clyde

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