it was the year you forgot my birthday. if anyone asks, that’s what i’ll tell them. the year the rain turned away from me. it seems so small now, but back then, the world was a war i was fighting. the trees all had shadows trying to ruin me. i tried to fix it. i even spoke to the birds, but they scattered like dandelion seeds. you wrote me a letter to tell me how lonely love was. i tried to retrace my steps to before it all happened, but our lives went on and our hearts never looked the same. i had a phantom poem in my head that i promised to give you if you stayed. you didn’t. the poem did. after two more years of silence, i was still sorry. i pictured your ghosts, and they looked nothing like me. i imagined a world where i was big enough to at least haunt you. it was the same world you burned down in all your dreams.












