Tattoos Poem by James Barrs

its tattooed there on the left side below the upper ventricle, your name, Yet, I've no clue how it got there? I despise tattoos on me and have with the lack of a scar a certainty that no one has yet seen with their eyes my heart, but damn it I'm sure it's there. In the spring when the weather turns I can feel it throb with each raindropp and temperature change, sometimes it weighs me down for days and pulls down my eyelids and shoulders I drove by the drive through wedding chapels today. Just like that night, we were driving down Las Vegas blvd, midnight or so, looking for something to do. It just seemed so natural, her in the passenger seat, me driving, spending most of the time with my eyes on her and not enough time with my eyes on the road. We passed one of those long lines of drive through, walk in, Elvis impersonator marriage chapel and she said, "Why don't we just go in and get married? " Oh, how my palms got sweaty and my heart did skip at least one beat, my face flushed and it seamed as though I just woke from the most glorious dream, to a reality of have to compose myself and say, "We can't do that."
What I should have done is told her how I really felt, although I'm sure now she knew anyway. I should have told her that if we went in there I would be happier than any who has walked this earth before, that I would have lived the rest of my days with a smile at just the thought of her, a smile that could not be erased by time or pain or poverty or loss, those things we all must go through. I would have placed that ring on her finger and her in my arms and swept her up in a whirlwind of affection and caring and love, the likes of which couldn't be blown away in the greatest of hurricanes or washed away by the tallest of tsunamis. However, what stopped me was the fact that even I knew that she could not be satisfied with me; she would eventually outgrow me and loose the will to fight for what I would die for. She would need to move on, and it would be easier on both of us if that started right then, with those three words. Although as you can see, there were many more emotions behind them just waiting to fall out. The worst secrete of all is that nothing has fallen out since then. With those three words I closed the windows and locked the door, and haven't come out. Worse still, no one has come in, or knocks, as the years now pass some like days some like centuries, all with pain, most with tears, of this you can be assured, an answer to that tree in the forest question, I suppose. Yes, even if no one is around, I still have thoughts and pains and dreams of you, and even though my memory now begins to fade, and the clouds roll into thoughts, making them hard to see, the visions of you are clear and strong, and where they belong, in the past, so you can move forward, and only I see the pain, loosing you has caused. I don't think it was worth it in the end.