Battle Season

Five seasons

have come and gone.

A war rages

between silence

and time.

For lack of evidence,

I maintain:

“Zero casualties.”

A battle of one.

In unpacking

memories of you,

I face the reality of

my hope versus the truth.

I fear that none of

life with you

was true.

I spent months

trying

to love you.

“I don’t think

we should try

to do this again.”

In the fight

between life and death,

your ambivalence

mocks my sincerity to you.

In the barren silence of my defeat,

spectators declare in disbelief:

“Death by treason.”

Headlines read:

“The first casualty.”