Names I Still Carry (Always)
I have too many names
that only exist in memories now
Too many numbers in my phone
that will never light up again
Too many songs
that have become impossible to hear
without feeling a little less whole
Nobody tells you
how strange it is
to lose people your own age
How the world keeps expecting you
to move forward
while pieces of your past
are buried behind you
I have collected funerals
like scars
Collected empty chairs
Collected unanswered questions
Collected the last words
I wish I could change
There are faces I still see
in crowded rooms
For a split second
my brain forgets
I expect them to walk in
To laugh
To tell me some ridiculous story
like they never left
And it hurts all over again
I wonder about the lives
they should have lived
The birthdays they missed
The jokes they'll never tell
The people they never got to become
It's cruel how someone can be gone
and still take up so much space
Their memories live eveywhere
In old pictures
In old places
In the quiet moments
when I have nobody to distract me
from missing them
People say
"At least you have the memories"
But sometimes memories are heavy
Sometimes love is a weight
you carry because there is nowhere else
to put it
I carry every friend
who couldn't stay
Every laugh
Every mistake
Every late-night conversation
Every moment that mattered
I carry them because someone should
Because they were more than how they
left
They were more then their struggles
They were people who loved
who dreamed
who made this world brighter
while they were here
And even though grief
keeps adding names to the list
I refuse to let the list
be all they are
They were not just endings
They were chapters
They were music
They were fire
They were alive
And as long as I remember them
a small part of them
keeps walking with me