DARCIE ANTHOLOGY: THE VAULT (CARDINAL VERSION)

THE VAULT (CARDINAL VERSION)

Missive of the Poet: This version is the original piece of my poem, Vault. I was frustrated, hurt, and angry when this idea came to mind, and all I cared about at that time was my feelings. Though this was already edited, and some of the words did not make it into the final cut, I just hope that this poem finds you well.

Vault (Cardinal Version)

How long will our love stay in the vault?

A secret only our eyes and heartbeats knew.

I bleed in the battle, like a first line of defense soldier,

Yet I still lose you. 

A war that I fought hard on this island,

I gave you all I had in this wildfire.

The stolen glances in this aisle,

Burning the pages in this file.

I made you the pigment of this life,

Yet you made me the villain in your play,

As if I were the antagonist of your beautiful love story,

A thorn in your love's clemency.

You fought for your love for her while ours was still in composition.

What a shame to have an unpublished, deleted chapter about us.

I called it quits and shut the door,

Because the blues and hues in my sky were the answer all along. 

I fell first and fell hard, yet you left me first.

But is it wrong to assume that you hinted at me first? 

You made the first move, yet you were the one who gave up on us first.

And you didn’t even let me hear my response; you just walked away from me first.  

I know and have seen this scene before,

Yet I still gave you a legion of chances.

What a wasted, unfinished, amorous story!

We were one of those unfortunate could-be lovers who met at the wrong party.

Those nights when I wanted you vanished like the figments of a dream.

How can you say that you are hopeless if you can't see the signals and signs in my eyes all this time?

An expression of my passion in this field,

But all is said and done, and I died in dispossession.

My eyes were shining bright

But you didn't grasp the indication of the page. 

How could you be a crimson with her and, at the same time, a yellow to us?

What a marine blue, melancholic love story for us!

It was us in the picture, shot by a Canon.

It was us in the story in our heart's senses. 

It was us in the film scene, lost in the daydream

Now, I die in the fire, screaming.

In the boulevard of love, I lost you the love of my life.

I fell into the trap and was stabbed in the back.

You betrayed me in the troop of cavalry 

And you tore the pages as if you hadn't colored my life sky blue.

You painted my eyes, but I just couldn't grasp the pictures.

You left me with so many wonders and questions.

Your smile screamed my name whenever you glanced at me all this time,

But you just went to her with a ball of twine, leaving me here to call you on the line. 

Were you scared I wouldn't see your pantomime in this show?

But I have seen it all along and felt it with all of my heart.

I haven't said anything, but you just disappeared from my sight,

Yet I have loved you all this time.

I wanted you to fight something on us,

Because you gave me your eyes on my gloomy, miserable nights.

You can't say that I don't get it, and you understand,

When I could even decipher the words that came out from your lips by looking you in the eye.

You can't say that I don't see it, but you feel it,

When the silent treatment is the hint on this page.

You chose her over me and ran into paradise with her.

I was a beautiful rose, now an ugly thorn on this stage.

You can't say that I didn't fight any of it,

When I was the one who crashed down my walls for you,

Built it for years to guard against the wars that I had been through.

I was shut down in the combat of your battalion, like a full warrior in the barracks, ready to face the mayhem, yet I still lost you.

I want you to also risk something and choose,

But you weren't there and left me all alone, like a broken promise written in a crumpled gazette, ready to be thrown out in this silly game.

I was left here all alone, bleeding on the battlefield,

While my heart just died when I saw you with her. 

You colored my cold, depressed, black sky, and the wind that was once cold turned warm

In a crowd full of romance, I once pictured us.

The sunset of July can vouch for our tale,

The crash of the waves was the testimony of our book.

But the waves in March were too strong and too much to handle.

The memories I thought would save us went cold and dark.

The warmth that I always felt when I was with you now feels cold.

I was once your focal point of view, but now I am a peripheral part of your life.

You gave me the password to your terrain.

I could be an incorrect code or pin, and you would still not open the door for me,

But you gave her the key to your field. 

Yet, I was there with you first. 

You held her hand and looked at her, while storms raged in my eyes as I looked at you.

How could you leave me here and crash my world?

When you first gave me the gesture,

Stolen stares of June are both now buried in secrets.

Haven't you realized? She was me.

She was my version, the one you called home---

A tawdry who stays when everything's complacent,

But abandon and quit if it rains.

Run and leave in paradise when it's cluttered.

Bland. Menial. Immature. I wasn't.

You would be the cover of her in the charivari of your film,

And her hand would slip into yours as she ran away.

You gave me myriad messages and warnings.

How could I not assume?

I gave you my answer and let you in and break my soul,

Yet you didn't grasp the line and chose to run with her.

But do you know that I noticed your secret glances at me while she was talking to you?

Do you notice how her face turns gloomy gray when you call my name while she's saying something to you? 

I would still give you a legion of chances if you would just say it.

But you brushed aside my entire existence as if I was never a part of your pages all this time. 

As if you never told me secrets, she didn't know. 

We both laughed in an unfathomable way.

If I told you the word, would you still fight for it?

Silence is my answer, and you didn't get it.

I was willing to give you my eyes and lend them to you.

What a summer to end with these painful aches.

We were one of those unfortunate supposed-to-be lovers who lost track of time and communication. 

A dry gouache paint in the palette needs to be revived. 

You should prepare for short-lived happiness.

You wouldn't find my traces on the battlefield.

You loaded your gun, aimed it at me, and shot me,

Reversing the tables and letting me catch the fall. 

Someone shed a tear and bled your chronicles,

And I stayed quiet in the darkness of the silence. 

You should know from the old school of thought that if someone is hurt by your narrative, there's no happy ending to your story.

It was not in my prayers, but the hurt was written in my diary. 

My eyes were all bloodshot, searching for answers.

While you laughed with her in your drama.

What a scheme! It was supposed to be a blockbuster hit for us.

What an unwelcome, so-called cold home!

Where were I supposedly at those times in your life?

Was she the woman and I was just the girl? 

Was she the one, and I was never the one? 

But how could you rain on my parade when you didn't intend to stay?

I was almost in your story, your option, but never your last choice. 

Did I do something wrong that made you walk away and doubt?

Three nights, and I went silent to give us an answer.

I was taking my own time naming our relationship.

But was that enough reason for you to jump to the conclusion that we were not in the same book? 

I had heard that you were now with the woman I had an idea about.

Did you plan this to get even because I went cold?

Or were you afraid that what had us would spread like fire, and we would become strangers?

You doubted us, and you left me but look who's still mourning?

If you had just read between the lines of my signs, 

None of us would bleed apart.

I was a coward to let you go, and I was a fool to hope you were still into me. 

Seven years of New Year's have come and passed, and I am still lingering in the shadows of hurt.

I watched you walk down the aisle with her,

And I was standing in the corner, holding on to those little promises,

While you met her halfway and chose her,

Leaving me in the middle of this page, wondering when you would come and get me.

You sealed her with a kiss.

In front of those adults and green kids.

There you maimed me!

I'm tired of being the phoenix in this messy place, tracing a smile like I won the game.

I have the memories, but I wasn't the ending.

And I was there with you first, yet she got the ring.

I had the words, but I wasn't wearing the promise.

I got the vow; she got the man.

I wasn't the sharp edge; you reciprocated our notes with the wrong tones

And fired me the bullets that I once expected.

You never think twice;

You never blink once.

I was lost in the scenery.

It was now you and her in the ministry.

You throw a bomb at my bravery,

I became a poltroon in this story. 

You loaded your gun and aimed it at me,

And you wanted me dead in the pyre,

'Cause you can't sleep at night,

Hunted by those secrets in fallacy.

You stabbed me with your armor,

Leaving me with deep scars.

You pinched my soul with this hurt.

What a lame, discomposed song that stayed in the florilegium and was never released. 

The matrimony you thought was the ending of your novel ended badly in court.

The affair in this story never had a perfect ending to begin with.

Once a nice fantasy full of roses, it had a common denouement with the word conclusion in this tale.

Now, it's a thorn of hatred in the garden, with a verdict in the trial.

You should know that when you come back to me,

You are already on the blocklist of my valor.

Pierced through my cold, bloody heart, with emotionless eyes down to the death of my soul.

Clandestine feelings of August are now dead and gone.

I've mastered this game already.

You can't sleep at night, searching for a so-called home.

Your eyes will meet mine and look for those welcome warmth,

And those stares and beats of our hearts will remain in the vault, like the unfinished, unrecorded, untold composition left in the notes of an anthology.

How long will this love stay in the vault? 

Smiles and secret glances along the way,

Cold waves of November, yet I was still here,

Sitting in this train of hurt in the alleyway.

If those eyes were the indications of our sensations,

What went wrong in our daylight compassion that turned into gloomy gray dust?

I was sailing alone in this surge, fighting the storm, searching for the shore to call someone home.

The feelings and the hurt—would forever remain a mystery in the vault.