The Difference

This time I've got experience and
therapy and Paxil in my back pocket.
I've got dreams and goals and love
For myself and the will to keep living
for my self.
I decided that old wounds weren't
going to stop me from
forgetting how to form sentences
every single time I look into those
beautiful baby blues that
chip away at the facade of
the tough tattooed girl
hardened by the overextension
of heart strings by the hands of ex-lovers
who once held titles of "future whatevers"
with fantasies of weddings and children
and destination vacations held together
by the same heart strings that
are on the cusp of snapping.
Despite that, I leave my heart without
a bevy of armed guards atop stone walls
surrounded by a moat supplied with sharks
anticipating to gobble up the next jerk
that makes me cry.
This time will be different
because you are different
and because I am different.
But the familiarity of pulled heart strings
and impending rejection
erases any notion of difference
and it is all the same.