The train hums low and beastly, at last, carrying you past the horizon’s edge. Monied interest stitches the world shut behind you, full pockets clinking like an end-credit song.
Each step you took scattered dust into dusk.
I watched your shadow stretch, then snap, a thread cut loose from this simulation’s clumsy loom. The wind carries its promises, in perpetuity, as your laughter still echoes in my hollows.
But promises, they’re mighty fickle, aren’t they?
The café where we lingered is empty now, its chairs stacked like memories no one cares to claim. I wonder what life would have made of you, a painter of storms or a keeper of stars?
The coffee’s gone cold, you’re already a ghost.
Leaves fall, gleefully, as if they know their purpose. Goodbyes are like seasons tripping over themselves. Nothing in the world buys reprieve from this, there’s no return trip, no ticket back.
The trees sway, whispering your name to the sky.
I stand at the edge of this fleeting world, where goodbyes bloom like weeds, stubborn and wild. In perpetuity, I’ll carry with me this quiet wound, wondering if you, too, ever paused to look back?
But the stars, they never answer, they only wink their hints at me.
~Eric Vance Walton~
(Gif sourced from Giphy.)
