Words

It's getting close to midnight and I should be in bed. In fact I was in bed 2 hours ago, but I got out of bed. And for words.

I lay there in the darkness feeling the tears trickle down my cheeks and willed myself to sleep. To listen to the strong regular breathing of LH and to forget about words. To stop hoping for words. And feeling them come unbidden into my head, to feel them trouping around. But not once the words I wanted most.

Words have such power over me, and I don't even remember giving it. A slave to an unhealthy relationship that I've never been able to escape. I once wrote that the rain was my one true love, but it pales into jealous insignificance when it comes to words.

Words bind me. They enlighten me, embolden me. They cheer and cajole, they caress and they confuse. Words have the power to build in my chest, to expand and fill until they burst in a maelstrom of emotion. They uplift me and hold me up to the Gleam, they let me dance in it and capture tiny reflections that I post here. They make me laugh, and consider, and feel. Words grab hold of my imagination like a child grabs your hand and pulls me along for adventure. They set me dreaming, they can excite the most secret parts of me.

I love knowing where they've come from, where they've been and where they're going. I love knowing who created them. Words that grow and have families of their own, new and fascinating uses, evolution before your eyes. Sadness that the French limit to make pure instead of seeing the beauty of the growth of words and language.

Words define me. They express joy and sadness and anger. They allow me to be rational, to stop fights or to overcome them. Words give me the power to be understood. Words in anger, words in secret furtive whispers in the dead of night, words in sensual overtones each one deep and heady and seductive. Words to music, bits of my soul floating suspended in the air.

I lay there in the dark, silently sobbing, willing the words to go away. To not care about words so much. Knowing that if I got up and gave in to them that I was making a choice that I should not be making. But I couldn't. I want to. I want to not care about words so much. For them to merely be the sounds that trip from my lips when thought or touch or action are the main players.

But I couldn't. And I'm here. Wondering if words will take it all away one day.