Waltz with a tornado and be swept off your feet. A natural disaster for dancing, he cannot lead. So destruction is sure to follow him. Ballrooms are no place for a twisted lover. Or his 21 year-old tantrums.

 

Breaking floorboards are inside jokes I cringe at. How can you laugh out loud when your smile is made of smashed chandeliers and rusted gold leaf? Crumbling columns for legs, I’m used to not supporting myself. Carrying the weight of us wrinkled my grandeur. New lovers marvel at my ruins – take pictures with their iPhones for souvenirs. I’m nothing more than a moment worth capturing. Just an old masterpiece art students learn about. They never love me. I am a travel destination and you were the first of my many tourists.

 

Sometimes it’s even hard for me to look at the wreckage. Erected a coliseum from my rib cage

and watched my heart fight for you. Took mouthfuls of blows just to prove its digestion of bullshit. I have tasted too many fists from your growing pains. I’m left with this ugly architecture

and these awful memories of what I used to be.

 

The afterglow of your skylines showed me how gorgeous you could be. In my blindness, you built me a city of intangibles. I find myself walking the Magnificent Mile window shopping for dreams - looking for a white picket fence green grass, and a welcome mat. I am banned from the Water Tower. The fountains are obese with spare change and foolish wishes. Was I wrong for being greedy for the one thing you could never give me? Security told me I was wasting my time and money.

 

When you turned your back on me, I forgot what brighter days were. My shadows ran away and

they won’t come home. Just as you were, they are afraid of following me. I only leave my room on sunny days in case they change their minds. I watch the weather to see if you’re stopping by. I’m no scientist but I was determined to discover the methodology of your damage - why everything you touch becomes non-existent. That even in pieces they manage to love you with all of them. Oceans with sailor ambitions are platforms for your destruction. I hurt myself in the end.

 

How silly of a human to think love could be conditioned! I know this may seem odd, but now I think we’re even. I understand that you cannot make yourself a home for uncontainable guests. You will only become discards for a dumpster. I’m still rebuilding myself.

 

But you, you enjoyed making a mess of me. And always left before you could repair or make things right. But, I’m to blame. I’ve always had an acquired taste for uprooted trees, flooded streets, and emergency alarms. I knew I wouldn’t find a more perfect storm than you.

 

But forget everything I just said. These words don’t mean anything. I was just thinking about you. And you were never one to think far ahead. I’m always thinking about forever.

 

You know what they say:

you never forget your first.

 

I mean your first tornado, that is.