The Me After You

From the very beginning

I was a no one

wandering

through existence

with no resistance

~

It was all

just as so

Success—I didn't know

If I had disappeared

Who would have cared?

~

That was

my grim reality

Friendships—a triviality.

Nothing

to gain

everyday pain

~

Then

something changed.

My feelings—rearranged.

A reason

to survive,

a need

to stay alive.

~

you.

~

and the world we created

scrapped

my original plan,

rewrote

the journey I began.

~

Indebted—to your love,

surrendered to you—enough.

~

So to disappear,

to vanish

no trace—

every memory banished

~

could only happen

with you

leaving.

Walking away.

~

As my life lay in ruins, the cathedral of our love torn down by gentrification and moving on,

I found every turn, every corner of the city we built

a reminder of you—

a reminder of us—

a reminder of me,

the me after you.

~

The me before you, of course, was gone.

All that remained was a mirage,

a phantom,

a ghost of myself.

~

Everything I came to be

revolved around you.

*

Thanks for reading!

Author's Notes: This is my second entry for the Instructions for Disappearing Challenge as part of SWS. It is loosely inspired by the My Chemical Romance song "This is How I Disappear" from the classic "Welcome to the Black Parade" album. Not autobiographical.

Here is my other entry for the same challenge and a couple of other pieces: