I wasn’t there, but I still see that image of you in the front seat of your car. The lights were on and it was a hot and humid morning; the sun was just coming up.

I remember that hollow feeling in my chest and the knots in my stomach when she told me in the doorway of the office; it’s that same feeling that I get.

I made phone calls to all our old friends to make sure they heard it from a familiar voice than read it in cold, dead words from a screen.

Mike asked if I was kidding, but remarked I would never joke like this. I heard the faintness in his voice. I heard the aching on his breath.

I was dressed in black that Saturday morning sitting patiently behind that wall that separated me from my friends. The guitar sat idly on the ground; my hands trembled from the anxiousness.

I stood up in front of the most people I’d ever seen in one place. I looked out and saw so many familiar faces that I hadn’t seen in years. And I lamented to myself that it had been so long, and it’s been even longer still.

My shaking hands strummed out a simple song my voice croaked with regret; but I sand that song for you, my friend, and I’ve played it only

Once.

Since.

Give me passion soaked in remorse and sweat between these empty venue walls and all your burned out cigarettes, thinking "oh God, I've seen it all."

I forgot the melody I've been singing up and down these God forsaken halls and I've been feeling down and out, it ain't the same now since you've gone.

It ain't the same.
Since you've been gone.
It ain't the same.
Since you've been gone.

And I was kind of hoping this time I would come around.
And I was kind of hoping this time I'd stop freaking out.
And I was kind of hoping that this time I'd stop hoping for anything worth hoping to finally come around.

You and I have hands of bone. And when the darkness comes, we are all alone.

These howling winds are calling out in disbelief between the leaves in the trees and those weeds around your name.

These howling winds a-rattle my bones and this pouring rain never seems to end and these tiny rivers carry dirt from your bed on to my shoes.

You always looked so elegant in white and marble white suits you well, or so it seems.

These howling winds carry melodies somber and forlorn upon their backs and sending chills up my spine.

These howling winds scream at me in howling tones, "C'est la vie! Such is life!"

And I'll howl back.

My father said, "Son, your poetry is technically proficient and you certainly have mastered style, but you just say the words outright. You don't hide the meaning behind guile."

He told me that poetry was for interpretation of the reader, I was just to merely guide feeling but it was up to the reader to have to think.

Well, Dad. I think I'll have to disagree.

For me, poetry was a way to confront my fears of failure. To say the words I couldn't speak. To handle the loss of friends and family. To cope with the things that make me weak.

I suppose what I'm saying, Father, is I think poetry can be a narrative, just like any prose. So I'll keep writing the way I do, and hopefully it'll be good enough for you.

And if I'm wrong, I won't be great. I will fade into the obscurity of eternity, but somehow that seems satisfactory to me.

You know, I'm never sadder than those moments I realize how much I miss you.

And at first those moments came frequently and without delay but the pain they brought was simple. Dull; an ache.

But how as time crept slowly, the moments so frequent would come intermittently when I was most vulnerable.

But that dull ache was replaced with a deeper longing and a pain I couldn't shake. And it would stay with me for days and haunt my fevered sleep with memories I just wished would go away.

But I fear if they were to stop, I would lose all sense of self.

I already write so sparingly.

So please, just spare me the impertinence of soliloquy, that indecent exposé.

All these lines in the pavement
Start to feel like home;
Like cracks in the foundation,
I've got fractures in my bones.

It's become exhausting being a caricature of a human. All at once, I'm too over-the-top to be considered normal and much to internalized to have real depth with the people I wish to have depth with.

And god knows, I've gotten better at being honest. Not that I was much for lying, at least in perhaps the most traditional sense of the word. But I certainly was incapable of having real human interaction. Maybe it was fear that kept me frozen and unable to communicate what I wanted most to say.

Surely, it was a defense mechanism. It's a lot harder to be disappointed by someone when you refuse to let them be close to you. And it's certainly a lot harder for someone to break you into insignificant pieces when you don't allow them any hold on you.

But somehow being distant because of the fear of people breaking you leaves you even more vulnerable to it. I lost ----- because I couldn't be a real person.

I lost you too.

And perhaps it's too late to make amends and say, "I swear I'm not quite as horrible a person as I've pretended to be. The caricature I've become is definitely not what I intended to be."

But I just want you to know that I'm trying to be honest. And I'm trying to be happy.

But I know I'll never let you know.