Power Struggles
I’m sitting by the phone,
Waiting for you to call
So that I can be rude to you
And bang the phone down.
I’m counting the seconds tick by wondering what’s taking you so long.
And each second you delay, I miss you more,
Hate myself for missing you
Hate you for making me hate myself
And love you less.
I’m fighting an urge to call you myself,
Because I know you’re waiting at your end of the line
To do the same to me, that I plan for you.
Which of us will break first?
Probably it will be me.
Probably I will concede defeat,
And with an energy born of desperation,
As that of an addict to his drug,
I will break the inertia and my pride,
And call you.
And listen to your sneering victorious words
Tell myself I should be happy because you’re happy.
And hate you because..
Your happiness and mine seem to be mutually exclusive.
Then again, maybe I won’t do that.
Perhaps I’ll survive this test of wills
And smile triumphantly and in relief as the phone rings.
Of course you will probably be armed even in your defeat,
With such tools as emotional blackmail and guilt trips.
So my victory will be tainted with the foul odor of bitterness.
And what if neither of us should call today?
Well there’s always tomorrow and the day after that,
And the rest of our lives…
And if we never see each other again
It’s just that the power struggle would have lasted our lifetimes instead of a few hours.
