The Solitary Man

When it comes to the person I love, I have not been able to be as modern as everyone else. I have not wanted the whole world, nor sought the affection of all. I have always wanted only one person, entirely mine. I did not want to share that person with anyone. In this one thing, I confess, I am terribly narrow-minded. Perhaps that is why that one person, wholly my own, has never truly become mine.

I wanted to hold my person with such care, to guard them from everything. But no man can truly be held in chains, nor does he wish to be. They are free; they will not accept that anyone should own their will, should decide their life. They cannot bear it.

And I—I am impossibly stubborn! When someone else touches something I care for, or asks for even a small share of it, I cannot accept it anymore. Something within me refuses. The moment I see it after that, I feel such revulsion, such spite... Why should anyone else have what is mine? Even for a moment... but why?!

I can no longer claim them as my own. It causes me great pain—pain for that person—yet still I cannot turn back, cannot trust them again. For me, relationship and love are sacred things. I believe that if dishonesty enters the space of love, of connection, then the relationship becomes, in a sense, defiled; a betrayal of the person, a betrayal of their love. Truly, any act we cannot do before others or speak of openly—that act is necessarily called into question.

Perhaps I could not have loved you so completely had I seen you show the slightest emotion or attention toward another in my presence. Thank goodness I have not seen it yet. Should that day come, I fear I would shatter entirely from within.