Viking Funeral: For The Love That Never Let Me In

I dragged it for years—
this dead, heavy love,
tied to me by a noose
woven from blood and hunger and hope.
It bruised my skin,
buried itself in my bones,
left my hands bloodied
from clawing at the walls of a heart
that never opened.

I wore my yearning like armour,
battered and rusting,
believing if I fought hard enough,
if I tore myself into paler pieces,
there might be room for me.

But love, in his world,
was a shifting target,
a door that locked itself
just as I arrived.

I learned the language of double binds,
where every word meant its opposite,
where affection was a blade
disguised as an embrace.
I lived in a house with no windows,
only mirrors,
only mazes.

And still—
God, how I begged.
How I bled.

But tonight,
I build the pyre.
I lay down every unsent letter,
every dream I was forced to bury,
every prayer whispered
into a silence that never answered.

I strike the match.

The flames take quickly—
hungry, furious—
devouring the wreckage of what I was never given.
The boat drifts out
into the black water,
a burning ghost
carrying the love
that was never mine.

I do not call it back.
I do not wade after it.
I let it go.

I stand barefoot on the shore,
the smoke clinging to my skin like memory,
watching the fire shrink into the dark.

And when the last ember winks out,
I turn.
Lighter.
Emptier.
Still alive.

This, too,
is a kind of surviving.