Would You Need Me More If I Needed You Less?
By Tyler Knott Gregson
Would you need me more if I needed you less? Would you reach for me more, if my reaching stopped entirely? Would you, if my hand stopped uncurling, and stopped its shaking and made itself into fists around you, fists that can’t be held and forget the warmth of other fingers, crave the feeling of my fingertips on the back of your own hand? Would you pry my scarred fingers apart and force yours between them, filling the spaces, and splitting the spider webs and columns of dust that have attached themselves in the most ornate and gorgeous patterns from underuse?
What would your lips do if my lips stopped diving through the most terrifying emptiness that is the feet or inches or miles between each other just to land upon yours? Would your lips dry and wither and shrink back into your face out of shame and fear and the agony of defeat or would they rise and fill with blood and purpose and red rover red rover send your kisses right over through the wall of my arms crossed in front of my body just to glue themselves to mine once and for all and would you fall asleep with them slightly touching?
If I gave less would you require more? Would you give more to make up for the difference, to fill the air with love instead of sorrow and hope instead of despair? If the words, all the words that I’ve bathed…