I am a deeply flawed collaborator
Looking back at the past
In old photographs
I catch a glimpse of
Someone I once loved
And my stomach churns
With an acidic burn
That crawls up my gut

She is a smiling memory
In cliché haunting me
Not dead but not who
She used to be
Fourteen years ago

I wrote her poetry
To express what she meant to me
But she had to leave
To join the military

In one of those silly vows
We promised to be together
If we were still single
When we were thirty or forty
She has probably forgotten that

The white navy hat
The uniform of black
If I could go back
I would not

But to be honest
The loves we lose
Will probably always
Haunt us
But it sure makes
For good poems