I don’t know what led to what first;
the warmth in my embrace,
the cold side of my bed,
the soft Christmas songs
whispering the arrival of a new season.
How ironic that forgetting
was how I remembered
the memories that survived
Memory is a cruel tide
rushing in only when the shore
has grown quiet again,
when I finally stopped searching
for your face in crowds,
stopped replaying the end
like a scratched vinyl
that’s when your name came back
to the tip of my tongue,
weightless
uninvited
like a ghost
tapping the glass just to prove
it still knows the way home.
And maybe that’s all love ever was:
a haunting season that comes back around
even after the branches have learned
to live without eager leaves.
I don’t miss you but the version of myself
who believed such sweet things
like the safety of the almost,
the silence before it all fell apart.
So here I am,
in the glow of another season,
offering no prayers
lighting no candles.
Simply letting the cold be
and let it warm up where it may
because some things are better left
as echoes,
as distant bells carried by the wind,
as the shadow of a feeling
you swear you’re done with
until it brushes your shoulder
one more inevitable moment.