I miss the world I torched with my (magic?) wand, so many mountains I promised to lay myself down between, when the nights bit hard and the winters were shouldered by better men. Sometimes, I seek out reminders; as if I relish in the wrenching, fill my nights with foreign, forgotten words that have, in their heaviness, the nest they grow around me, a way to bring me home, again, ask back the memories I laid beside flowers and filled wounds.
I miss, strangely, glass cups I could balance on my knees. I miss the pale green track suit that helped me to modernize, to blend in with dark haired beauties and so many shields from the sun. I miss the roads, cherry treats, ventilated cars, a burgeoning build up life to be mine.
It is gone and yet, sometimes I lie down beside it. Sometimes I caress its cheek as if, kissed once, loved enough, it will wake from this long and painful sleep. Sometimes, I lie beside it because the sorrow--sedentary now in most days of life--wants to remind me of who I was, those many years of making me right. And sometimes, it is only really guilt, as I know the crumbs swept up forcefully were taught by the life I did not choose; I feel guilty for the quilt I laid in, almost wicked in my greed.
And then I think of another life left behind, how jealous I am of the red bricked roofs and other, spoiled girls, who write their names. How close I came, inscribing mine not in ink, but blood, patterned mornings when I blamed the woods, I begged the stream to cool me, quickly home.