Elephant In The Room

There's an elephant in the room
And it's called Us.
It didn't come by easily;
It was born over years and years
And months and days
And moments spent listening to Band of Horses
While you gently swayed like a
Tree in my lap to the music.
While you ran to check if your father had
Left the house, and ran back to kiss me
While we helped each other discover each
Other, while you and I 
Spent the nights whispering in half-awake
Whispers, inching like two turtles, day after day, towards
That one fateful day when you could say
You loved me, without hesitating
Or wondering if you
Were more hopeful than truthful.

It's been days and days and
Months and years
Since that winter day, and now
We meet in unfamiliar drawing rooms
And the air is pregnant with a whole 
Litter of stillborn sentences 

There is an elephant in the room
And it is Us.
And it breathes down heavily down 
Our necks and we half-wish that
It would swing its trunk in impotent
Elephant-rage and destroy the room,
This too-small room,
And then spontaneously combust 
Into flames, and die. 
And we would heave maudlin sighs
And we would make a bonfire
And collect our vanities - our letters
And books and trinkets
And watch everything burn down
And maybe hold hands 
And smile melancholic
As we watch
Everything burn down.

But for now the elephant sits alone
In the corner and 
Watches us.
Through its beady black eyes
Watches us
As we talk in parallel streams.
And soon, after years and years
And months and days
And moments spent avoiding eye-contact
The elephant shall wither away
Die, silently.
Unmourned. Forgotten.

Until some day, you and I shall watch lonely clouds
Wander over our coffee mugs, and wonder
Why there is an elephant-shaped bump
In the rug.