the birds came back after winter
and asked about you
and i told them thatÂ
   i gave the dream backÂ
and so they left, their feathers fluttering andÂ
giving the sky a new voice
and their hearts believing just a little less
and i carried that guilt
knowing they lost something and i was the one
to take it from them.
youâre so gone, youâre another life.Â
     but if it counts for anything, you were a good life.
all your seasons were warm and things grew.
when you didnât eventually show up,
i pictured you on a train somewhere,Â
    sleeping through your stop and endingÂ
up in an unfamiliar city.
     or else on an airplane landing in a time zone where you belongÂ
to a different tomorrow.
my heart is sleepless now and so it canât dream.
itâs okay if you canât forgive that. i canât either.Â
i even lost the sky
and then a country and then another
and i was a native nowhere and my heart was fluentÂ
in no languageÂ
and words began to fail meÂ
so i failed them back and it didnât helpÂ
and i tried to draw a new map where the people i lovedÂ
could be found easilyÂ
but it led me elsewhereÂ
and i forgave that too
and then tried to forget the word for homesick
 in every languageÂ
and erased it from everywhere,Â
even the poemsÂ
not yet written.Â
which maybe means the poems were kinderÂ
but not as honestÂ
so they hurt in new ways Â
that were cruelerÂ
and others noticed and saw through itÂ
and filled in the blanksÂ
which means the ghosts became impossible to move
and impossible to ignore
so i gave them names because it was the least they deservedÂ
and i called after them and fed them well
and so their haunting got biggerÂ
but i couldnât blame them
and i was kind
and good
and they took it as permission.
pixelskylines
2087
jbbartram-illu
yousharknotpass
gummygunk
areudirty
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jacobvanloon
prguitarman
theartofmadeline
