been a friend. loved louder.

this isn't really a post but i just wanted to bring attention to this poem!! it's really great

ok so i was reading this nabari no ou fanfiction (i know, why do i torture myself so) and there was this totally rad!!!! poem interspersed throughout and i was like wow

as in "wow i am crying and can hardly see anything through the tears but goddamn if this isn't a fucking great poem"

anyway apparently this poem is an amateur poem; that is, it wasn't written by some famous established poet and was published on a site. but it's also actually quite famous and has inspired quite a few fanfictions.

anyway so here's the link.

it's called "innocence already lost" but i thought the lines "been a friend. loved louder." was wayyyy more empathetic. (anyway it made me cry the hardest. i literally started sobbing when i read it)

so anyway i replicated it here:


it wasn't snowing yet, but they'd told us it would.
probably I said something infantile, about how
I could smell it, the frostiness of snowflakes in the
air, because you smiled that knowing smile of yours, 
like you were an adult and i was a child and you 
didn't have the heart to take my innocence away.

that look always made my heart smile, sadly, and
it also drove me up a wall, partly because it made 
me want to hug you close and pity you the
burden of assumed moral superiority, and whisper
that you, too were a child. but mostly because you
were right— I clung to my naiveté while you, you
had already had the good sense to push it away.
it followed you around with sad puppy eyes, but 
you knew it and you kept it at arm's length. 
you brave, brave soul.

when it did start to snow I wasn't surprised. you 
were. you didn't say anything. we were in
a deserted school hallway, listening, removed
from the other kids' cries. we were
delighted too, but the others wanted to run home
early, and we knew the definition
of home better than they. and I can speak only for
myself but it seemed we both wanted only to stay
forever side by side, tucked away in our corner,
me reveling in the softness of love and friendship
and winter, you trying to be there with me but having
trouble leaving your mind, where that sad-eyed
puppy snapped at your heels. 
but you held your own.

and slowly, we built up moments like this one.
we wallowed in each other and in the coziness
of cloudy days. we read good poetry and 
heard good music and took photographs as we
discussed life from our  softer world.
or at least mine was.
there were moments of such pure white happiness
that they came full circle to being sad,
simply because I knew I would never be that
happy again, and I was not wrong, and I didn't
want to be. and we had
sad moments, too, never ever think I am not 
happy to be sad with you.

and slowly, too, your innocence knew its
defeat, and sat obediently at your feet, 
and we shared things. 
but I was a child, and a weak one at that, and
G-d knew I was not as strong as you so He
gave me no great suffering to speak of, to 
share with you. no way to reciprocate the
vulnerability you gave, and that in
itself was suffering for me. 

I regret that I was not good at saying things.
I couldn't share them, but I was not strong
enough to deal with them myself, so that while
you had to be your own adult and push childhood
away, I clung hopelessly to mine as
I discovered me and watched it slip
from my small hands.

among the plethora of reasons I can give for 
bitterly hating sunny days is the
way the sun slanted through the window and lit
up your eyes and swilled particles around 
your face like fairy dust on the day you reached
out and pulled my lanyard over your own neck.
look, you said, content. almost proud. 
I'm wearing a bit of you around my 
neck, and you wove it through your
sunlit fingers, eyes bright. you tugged on it,
lightly. that's what love does, it strangles
you. yet we all want it.

and I gasped at the way that word sounded, 
so harsh in such beautiful sunlight on such
a soft face. but I don't want to strangle
you. I said that. thoughtlessly, 
instinctively. I regret it every day. in that regard,
you gave me the strength to grow up and deal
with suffering of my own, albeit of a smaller
scale— you are so damn strong.

when your ache tugged and tugged at you, 
tore you from reality, or brought you closer to it, 
it slipped its finger into that lanyard knot. loosened it. 
I could have reached out right then, as you had when you
pulled the sun-soaked string over your head, and
tightened it. tightened us. been a friend.
loved louder.

you were too strong to cry outside, and I tried so
hard, too hard, to suppress the instincts of a friend. I thought what
if that's not me? and I didn't tug the knot for fear of
pulling it apart altogether. if you run. when you run,
I know that two grown dogs
will follow after you, blocked 
from the sun by your receding shadow.




and i can't stop crying over these three stanzas:

among the plethora of reasons I can give for 
bitterly hating sunny days is the
way the sun slanted through the window and lit
up your eyes and swilled particles around 
your face like fairy dust on the day you reached
out and pulled my lanyard over your own neck.
look, you said, content. almost proud. 
I'm wearing a bit of you around my 
neck (and at this point i cry lots), and you wove it through your
you. yet we all want it.you. I said that. thoughtlessly, 


sunlit fingers, eyes bright. you tugged on it,
lightly. that's what love does, it strangles

and I gasped at the way that word sounded, 
so harsh in such beautiful sunlight on such
a soft face. but I don't want to strangle
instinctively. I regret it every day. in that regard,
you gave me the strength to grow up and deal
with suffering of my own, albeit of a smaller
scale— you are so damn strong.

when your ache tugged and tugged at you, 
tore you from reality, or brought you closer to it, 
it slipped its finger into that lanyard knot. loosened it. 
I could have reached out right then, as you had when you
pulled the sun-soaked string over your head, and
tightened it. tightened us. been a friend.
loved louder. (aaand at this point i am five tissues invested)