Placebo Called Love

And the rest well, is history

It began with joy or what felt like it

and my spirit diagnosed it as love.

“Love?” I whispered softly in disbelief,

drawing futility from the aches of misdiagnosed history.

My spirit nodded and affirmed its legitimacy,

so I held it with my fingertip —

enough to hold on briefly

till it convinced me itself of its strength.

The seconds ticked

and as they did my heart skipped to it.

The sight of this joy that I dangled on my fingertip.

My heart skipped, my heart cried,

my heart crowned it relief

and so I held.

I drew it closer.

My bones locked around it like roots claiming soil.

My mind spun quiet calculations — escape routes drawn, then erased.

My pride swelled like a lake satisfied after bountiful rainfall.

My palms pressed firm around this joy.

I wrapped it in peace

and it excited me.

But then out of nowhere my joy spoke —

it told how it wants to be held.

It commanded I hold it this way.

I paused.

“But why, dear joy?”

It hissed low. It grumbled deep.

Disapproval curled its edges like thin smoke.

“Look how I hold you, joy,” I beseeched.

“No — don’t do that,” joy retorted.

“Relieve me so.”

And I stammered, confused at its ask.

My own thought echoed —

“But the hurt, joy… the hurt I’d feel if I held you this way.”

It was a quiet plea for leniency,

quiet enough to be left unresolved,

quiet enough to rot untreated.

I turned to spirit

and once more it crowned the moment.

“It is love!”

So I loosened my old grip

and forced new angles into my hands —

shoulders curved inward, breath held shallow —

and recomputed my mind.

And now my heart no longer skipped.

It throbbed slow and heavy.

I trembled, terrified of repeating that old quiet ache.

The placebo my spirit once named “love” has finally failed.

And still joy commands I hold it.