gone home to die

“you’ve lost weight!well you’re sick so that makes sense.” “well of course i lost weight too i’ve been worrying about you.” “did you get taller?i think you’re taller!”

(i’m not, it’s just been that long since they’ve seen me.)

they are all very happy to see me, i am being celebrated.

i wonder how a lamb feels when it sees wolves rejoice at the sight of it.

though i am no lamb, not any longer, perhaps never was, and they are no wolves.

it was the case in the past that i would look at a can of the Cerelac baby food i ate from since i was a new born till i left them last and feel a stirring of complex emotions, now…nothing.

it’s all i had left, and now, nothing.

post script.

when i arrived at the airport, the very place i saw you for the last time,i looked for you and you weren’t there. when the train on the way home stopped at your university, where we first met, where we’d meet or kiss goodbye time after time in the last good summer of my life, you weren’t there. when i got home, you weren’t there, when i walked the barren parking lot of the strip mall we’d drive down to for groceries, you weren’t there.

there’s no reason you would be, you’re in another city, living another life with other people, i know that. i know. you have no reason to be here, especially least of all for me, yet i just can’t help but to always look for you every where i go.

“maybe they’re on vacation, maybe they’re visiting a friend.”

every street, every flight, every destination, every day, every night.

i suppose it’s time i accept it.

that you’re gone forever, and that im about to die.