Alay/Offering
by Rhandee Garlitos
(After Michael Cacnio’s sculpture with the same title)

The desire to linger
was all I yearned for.
So I imposed myself on you
as an act of love and offering,
by regarding your gestures
as a form of reverence,
even adoration.

Yet I knew that it was an exercise
in futility, to insist on your
companionship in order for us
to stay longer, together—
to bolster
my permanence. 

The hours were few and long
and quiet, so I believed
your silence to be your approving reply,
for you seemed content to perpetuate
the Lie. I returned to you

Did I matter to you?
This question
destroyed me, because it suggested
I have nothing else to offer,
and the future I wanted
to last, to embellish,
no longer holds anything for us.

I have decided to release you,
knowing the world will become
beautiful again. 
To let go is to allow you
to accept me.

There is no other purpose.
Nothing else compelled me to perform this act:
to have loved you when it no longer
involved you, I was utterly sated.