How Can It Be Poem by Leria Hawkins

How can beauty and beast
Subsist in a package of one
Humming, as angry as bees
Heartache, ‘neath a beguiling smile

You came to this place
Demanding of me, what you cannot give
Seeking…what you cannot find
Your heart chilled to the core

And you taught me to suffer
Forever yearning…yet denied
Seething in an ocean of self-contained turmoil
Enduring, as you endure…the secrets that you hide

Where is the empathy, babe
Compassion for the soft of heart?
I thought you'd carry me home, sweetie
Stead of leaving me cold…

What choice is there now?
What reward for the undying flames?
Should I endure such misery
So that you may thrive on my pain?

I am not yours, love
No matter how much I long to be
…I am not yours…

And you, sweetheart…are not mine