The magnificent architecture
of the unconcerned,
The lavish spectacle manufactured,
is hardly worth the time
or the love we waste
tracing the shape of their silence
Gazing at the unlit window
of their affection
longingly from across the way.

The illusion of peace
The appearance of love—
A perfectly maintained facade
Is sufficient for you;
But our names were never etched
on the key to the gate,
our hands never guided the blueprints,
forced to endure decisions we never made.

The drama carries on.
No desire from you to resolve it.
It’s easier to simply excuse it,
Justify it:
“It’s just the way it is.”
The gilded front door was never meant to open.

Yet you share the evidence of our exclusion
to keep up appearances.
All while revealing
the structural collapse for all to see.

Your own perfectly manicured illusion
is the broken pane revealing the truth.

We gaze from the road
at the glimmering grandeur,
clamoring for an invitation,
to belong,
simply desiring
the courtesy you display
to others so abundantly.
But it’s evident now that it’s all an illusion;
We were never meant to be part of your world.

Your values are revealed
through your words,
yet the rot beneath the foundation
remains hidden.

The cracks multiply;
The damage deepens.
But you focus on the champagne flutes,
on keeping the fountain running,
covering up the growing signs of distress.
Avoiding the inevitable future
toward which you are running.
A future without us.

Far worse are the vacant rooms
where thoughts of us should reside.
The illusion of warmth from an empty hearth
when your actions say otherwise.

The rejection would be smaller
—a single brick dislodged —
If we were simply informed,
instead of finding the truth
when the facade cracks. 

The harsh gleam of the photographs 
shatters the illusion that we mattered.

Better to be an afterthought,
a last-minute invitation,
than to never be a thought at all.

The wound is not the empty wings of the shared estate—
It’s that the silence within those wings was the original design.
It’s stumbling upon the cold image that proved
the exact moment we were forgotten.
A sudden cold vision of our own insignificance,
learned not once or twice,
but across seasons of absence.

Somehow, we’ve become
“unforgettable in every way.”

It is said that ignorance is bliss,
And while I usually disagree,
Perhaps I understand its worth.
Better to be unaware
than to know you’ve been utterly rejected,
time and time again.

It’s time that I choose a worthy ignorance:
the deep, quiet peace of
inspecting my own foundation,
and abandoning the unstable structure
to stand or fall alone.

Peace will be found
by drawing the blinds,
no longer needing
the blueprint of their absence.

I will not let your unlit halls
determine my light.
I will not let your empty echo
determine my sound.

I am worthy of more than this.