I mourn something, someone, that I have not yet lost.
I grieve (why?) you as you are sitting in front of me.
When you laugh, it feels like needles stabbing every pore.
My eyes burn as rivers attempt to flow through.

Your laugh, once soft, like a melody;
feels hollow, like a decaying tree.
Your eyes are ash, no longer the campfire
I saw all those years ago.

How did I not notice the disease
festering beneath your skin?
The distance between us is not physical.
We sit knee to knee, yet our souls are miles apart.

When you finally start to turn away,
I wonder, will I ever see the soul I once saw,
with scraped knees and sticky fingers
during 3rd grade recess?

I know once you turn we will never meet again.
I try to catch a glimpse, just one,
but the universe is cruel.
(Or are you? Am I? How do we know who is cruel and who is not?)

You leaving is like reading the final line of a book,
the last scene of a movie,
a casket slipping shut as it slowly gets buried.
This event will never be forgotten.

It is a gaping hole in my chest,
where your love once sat.