Vestige

Vestige
Now the tides no longer
Pull to the gravity of the moon
I won’t disturb your ghost
Who lives in ruins in my mind
Instead, I force the waves to freeze in their place
Fighting the weight of time
Before they darken the earth
And swallow the past whole
Lost to the depths of the sea
I keep the pieces of you safe
Locked away in a vault
In my mind where brass and golden broken artifacts of you still exist
I cling to them and polish them
Until the harsh edges fade away
To keep some part of you
With me forever
The ghost of you
Of your laugh and your eyes
That only come to life in dreams
Behind closed eyelids and heavy oak doors
Erased at early dawn
The waves abruptly halt before the salty coastline
And up on a rocky hill
Sits a museum with ivory columns
One room, wall-to-wall marble floors
It has high, arched windows that allow beams of warm sunlight to shine through
And dark pillars
With golden figures
And golden plaques
Some statues lean slightly
And some are chipped
But in every one of them is
A fragmented memory of us

Your green eyes piercing through me over a dimly lit pool table; “You’re solids”, I remind you, and the whole world around us fades to a distant hum.  
Singing Burn Burn Burn as we fly down the freeway, the night stretching endlessly before us.  Wind whipped through the open windows, and I lean out, free, brave, and alive. You stare at me, swerving on the road slightly, smile wide, and love me infinitely.
Smoking clouds billowing out your mouth on the terrace, air thick with the truth
My body circling yours in a frigid pool. Goosebumps and chattering teeth. I sit on your shoulders, falling backwards into cool water, and my muscles pulling us both back to standing
Meeting you for the first time, awkward lanky pre-teens, not yet fully developed. Your floppy hair, my braces. A quiet understanding, an instant connection, as if our souls had known each other in a past life  
Your shirt on my chest, still warm and smelling of you - cedar and smoke
You called me late at night, even when I could tell you were exhausted. You said you didn’t want to leave me hanging, even when you were drowning in your own head.
Strolling down the sidewalk underneath the cityscape, my hands on your head, body on your back
Sleeping in your childhood bed, limbs intertwined, your smile up to your eyes as you say “You look beautiful in the morning, too”
Coming up with nicknames for each other, ones that lasted 8 years; a language we spoke fluently
Your favorite songs blaring out the speaker of your beat-up black SUV, a thousand stickers above our heads
Sharing yogurt with the M&Ms on top with one spoon in a high school classroom. A silent trade made: I give you food; you drive me everywhere
Calling me eight times a day, telling me of each tiny detail – the people you met, your mediocre breakfast, the whiskey on your bedside table bought for when I visit next
Sneaking into bar bathrooms to hear your voice; you sleuth through a party’s glittering crowd to the quiet outside to call me

]Our first kiss, fire and passion, a decade of longing and mishaps and miscommunication all catapulting us into each other. Tension breaking in a single, breathless second. My failed attempts at remaining platonic, you pull me back in after my useless protest

Some plaques are etched deep in gold
Others are fading, dust-covered, and floating away with wind and time
Behind a locked door, whose key was cast over the jagged cliff-side
Sits a dark room
Filled with shadows
Echoes
Shame
That I never dare to open
The air is damp, the dust thick enough to choke
A puddle of bright scarlet gently pulses in the small distance
The room is stifling, cramped with fear
Cobwebs sit in the corners
Guilt creeps through the floorboards
Decaying the foundation
Regret takes shape in the image of me leaving you behind
Our last conversation

You can’t count on anyone in this world, Moonlight
Well, don’t worry, I don’t count on you

The finale of a decade unravels to its bitter end
A tapestry we made torn apart
Thread by thread, frayed and lost
There is no crash
Just a quiet suffocation of leaving you
You linger, a phantom in the deep blue
And hidden in the darkness
Where the light from the sun nor moon can touch
Sits the truth
Cross legged, bleeding out
Staining the rickety floor crimson
You never loved me
Not in the same way
And I can stop the tides, change gravity, love you better, hold you tighter, force you to see it, polish statues until my fingers are raw
And you still won’t ever love me the same
The statues will outlive us
The golden age spans far beyond our time
But none of it will ever bring you back
To my shores, where I sit
Cross-legged in burning sand
Waves eerily still
Patiently waiting for your ship’s signal
Like a star flickering until its death