Kryptonite – A Poem by Rachana

“To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves,” Federico García Lorca once wrote. This poem explores a kryptonite-like allure that softens iron wills, the digital-age loneliness of glowing screens and unsent messages, and the exquisite torment of silent desire. I’m not asking you to like it — only to feel the gorgeous ruin of two lovers never destined to be together.

In this room lit only by the cold blue of a screen,
you sit very still.
Just this morning in the boardroom
you were showing off that iron will of yours.

Now you guard your ruins, curved inward,
rereading my yesterday’s words
as if those few lines
are your only reason to stay awake.

Your fingers are aching to write
I really need you.
Not for skin, though the ghost of my nearness
still warms parts of you
too shy to reveal.

You imagine my voice shaping your name —
soft, unhurried.
Your eyes burn without tears.
Hair slipping forward.
A fingertip brushing a cup.
That quick rise and drop of my chest.

Every breath I allow near you
is a confession — you are powerless
to my gravity.
Your heart, once iron,
now bends and fractures.

In that crowded room, your gaze hunted me
until I pretended to escape,
before your strong hand closed around my wrist.
I couldn’t run.
And you shivered at your own surprising courage.

Imagine me bent, knees on your shoulders,
thighs framing your face, weight surrendered —
the world narrowed to heat and pulse
and the mercy you would never be asked to give.

Stop taking a road trip on me.
Come closer. Right now,
you’re too far away for me
to carve crescents on your back.

But I remain a silhouette —
near enough to ruin,
never near enough to save.
I’m your Kryptonite, silent and exquisite.
Never mind I never told you you’re my muse.

Still, we go on tormenting each other —
not because we must,
but because nothing else will ever feel this free.
Two shadows trying to heal,
only to fall apart
with every unsent word.

My eyes are slow currents,
dragging you under.
How I drove you crazy with my necklace,
crossing the road of my collarbones with my fingers.

I know it isn’t fair to haunt a lonely man all day.
Your life doesn’t revolve around me,
but your thoughts do —
a fire you can neither reach nor resist.

You will type
God, I really need you
and summon your will
yet again
to erase it with backstrokes.

I’ve made no promises
yet I set the pulse in your empty bedroom —
take me to the balcony
where I’ll refuse to be tamed.

We don’t have to lean in
for the air to shift.
And yet our worlds tilt.

Tomorrow the phone stays silent.
The day after, too.
I will not write.
What if I was never coming?

Damn, even the coyotes are mating.
Here, your mouth wants my taste,
yet you can’t even spell —
Thinking of you.

To burn with desire
and keep quiet about it
is the greatest punishment we can bring —
not on ourselves alone,
but on each other,
long after the screen has gone black.

Dense Scribbled Face – Copyright 18 year old who drew it

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Poetry

Human life without some form of poetry is not human life but animal existence. ~ Randall Jarrell