Bits of conversation fill my head
Tangling with words we haven’t said
Glimpses of a movement you once made
Knowing I could live but dream instead
Wondering if you saw the part I played
Whether I’m the reason that you stayed
Only half believing it could be
Well aware I want what I forbade
Questioning my own reality
Doubting in my mind the things I see
Altering perception fast as light
Do you know for years you’ve haunted me?
Speaking words you never could recite
Giving bliss as if to test my flight
All is but illusion, this I know
Yet more felt than objects in my sight
The world may see my skin but just below
Simmers what I think but never show
Lifetimes lived with you but more than this,
Guessing where in your sweet dreams you go
Do you drown in memory’s abyss?
Is there music in a voice you miss?
When you close your eyes do you relive
Each averted glance, aborted kiss?
Do you harbor what you should forgive?
Search for signs in every narrative?
Or repel all company save one,
Who is not cure but palliative?
While it’s possible these things you’ve done,
All too likely I’m the only one
And upon this thought my vision fled
So I end back where I had begun
Nothing but the present fills your head
Forgetting more than half the things I’ve said
Shadows of a sacrifice you made
Knowing you could dream but live instead.