He fell in love with a look
Not a woman
She brought to life
The fantasy he’d carried
Around in his head
Except she didn’t
Not in reality
He was in love with her
For a season
Until she broke
The illusion
Changed her look
Up until that point
He’d cheerfully disregarded
Anything in her behavior
Which didn’t match
His fantasy
But the visual matched
She had the audacity
To be dynamic
In tune with the environment
Not in the sense
Of being irrationally reactive
But analytically calculating
Like one who’s used to
Being on the right side of
Natural selection
Had she known
His love for her
Was so visually-based
She would have
Radically changed her looks
In the beginning
Spared them both
The slow metamorphosis
Of aligning themselves
To one another
All the while making sure
They’d both survive
The great what-shit-comes-next
Had he known how high
The quality of his life
Depended on her hidden strength
He wouldn’t have begun
The protracted conflict
To divide them
Actually, no
That’s not
What he tried to do
From his perspective
It was she who changed
Started all this confusion
People evolve
For different reasons
As much as he wanted her
To remain his fantasy
She was never
Just that
They’d met at one stage
In her metamorphosis
That appealed to him
Then she grew
Like she always did
And then they were heartbroken
He made the heroic effort
To save her from herself
She accused him of trying
To keep her in her place
Reaching into
His minute box
Of all things “woman”
Pulling out yet another
Misapplied label to define her
She made the heroic effort
To save him
Tried to stop him
From destroying them
He conservatively held on
To that which
No longer existed
She tried to bring
Him along her journey
He refused to move
At what point
Do you concede your investment
Of time, energy and fantasy
How much reality
Has to sink in
What is the sign
Do you wait for someone
To treat you worse than
You’d treat yourself
Whose stubbornness
Finally wins out
You wake up one morning
And remember you used
To be happy
Together
It is the greatest con
Of fairy tales
Living happily ever after