The Taste of Goodbyes

I wonder what makes goodbyes bitter, or what makes them sweet. What makes them taste like anything at all?

Do memories taste sweet? The scent of the sea, the memories of an idealized yellow-tinted sunlight where you basked and laughed and thought that the world couldn't be more perfect? The whirring of bicycle wheels, the smell of popcorn as you hold hands over dirty cinema seats. Sticky palms when you hold hands too long on a hot summer's day, the creak of the old swing in the shade of the porch. Or is it in the anticipation, the anticipation of your happily ever after?

People walk away. You walk away. I walk away.

And what of the anticipation of a goodbye? Could you, perhaps, feel that in the air around you, the fear slowly closing on your lips, your throat?

What we must speak on, we speak none of. You smell goodbye; you smell it like the dry itch of winter's advent, and the rustle of the coming clouds. You feel it in the the tick of the wall-clock as you pass the night away, pass the night awake. With the fear of being alone.

You fear it like a shadow and you spit it out. The taste of sweet, the taste of the sun, the taste of lips, the taste of sweat. And all you are left with in your mouth is your own words, tasting like nothing on the tip of your tongue.

Your tongue is numb.

Does that make it bitter? To lose the taste of sweet-- dissipated by the bitter fear, the bitter effort of keeping your head up without seeing into another pair of awaiting eyes, the bitter echo of empty words. Of empty promises that you know you cannot keep. That he cannot keep.

You watch yourself crumble and stick yourself together with honey, with whatever notion of sweetness you can salvage from the memories you keep. Then suddenly, you start minding the hot summer sun, the sticky sweat on your palms. You cling to the happily ever after you see on TV. You cling to the eyes that don't see you, and feel the gaze stare away, stare through.

Your senses dull themselves away to create a husk, a husk made of glass. A breakable husk, a see-through husk. You could see through yourself better than anyone else. He could too, if only he were looking.

You anticipated a goodbye. You convinced yourself otherwise.

You paint a picture of nectar and end up with the smell of shit.

You start to notice the smell of sweat, the roughness of skin, the bristles of hair that disturb your proximity. You start to notice the discomfort of the joints under you, beside you, holding you, tearing you apart. You notice his sunken eyes, his breath when he's drunk, the crookedness of teeth, the bent nose.

You start to stare at the lips you kiss. You keep your eyes open, in fear that he would run. Run, like you want to do now.

What do you taste now?

You taste goodbye rolling on the tip of your tongue, like nothing, like air, like water. You set fire to nothing, and douse whatever is left hanging with your love. No, your fear.

Nothing tastes sweet anymore. And yet it is not bitter. All that is left for you is the numbness of your tongue, your lips and your fingertips.

All that is left is the anticipation of goodbye, slowly boiling in your empty sky.