I remember a time when we knew how to fly. It was a feat that just came to us out of thin air, and oh how thin the air really felt when we took off. Our finger would cross, cross like the stitching of a hot air balloon that knew no bounds, filled with the air we exchanged into each other’s lungs, and propelled by the pulsing flames of our hearts. Your sparkling eyes were intoxicating whenever they met mine, they bore the same sparkle as the wishing star in the sky I used to put all of my hope and dreams into. Every instance our lips locked into each other, whenever your mellifluous hair sashayed by my nose, or each time you cradled my weary head to your *****, the more our wings grew; grew to a point where together we could soar to heaven off of a single push. We danced through marshmallow clouds as our wings tickled the sky. You carved your name across the top of my heart then tucked the needle of a compass beneath it so I always could find my way home. We never knew where we were going but trusted the winds to take us where we needed to be. We never turned our backs to the skies for it was our refuge, it was our entirety. Together in the far reaches of space, boundless and free, the world below became a place we had long since forgotten.
I remember a time when there was gray in the sky, a gray that hued to black. Together we could not recognize these skies and quickly became unsolicited. The livid winds and the bitter clouds would pierce our ears as they shrieked in malignance. A storm had brewed and the rain was falling. The drops snuck through the cracks between our hands. The harder we grasped for each other the more we slipped until the stitching our fingers once made became frayed then torn; we were disconnected now. The whirlwinds then casted us further and further apart until you were shrouded by darkness. I was naked and alone save for the grief I then became, facing the murkiest region of the storm. The clouds I once frolicked with now spat a deathly light in my path until there was nothing I could do and nowhere I could turn. I wished to my star but I could not see your sparkle anymore. I was at the mercy of the skies I once called home however mercy was not to be arranged. The bright light paralyzed me hard and fast straight through my heart, gouging out the needle that always brought me back to you. I fell down from the sky at speeds greater than I had ever flown up. Crippled from above I was laying on the surface, with not even a scent of familiarity. My once trusted winds fed the flames that now scorched my majestic wings and took with it the fallen ashes they sprinkled. The name on my heart I once cherished became a curse, an endless reminder of what I could never find again, where I could never go again. I laid there utterly vulnerable with a single hand outstretched, reaching for the world I once knew, reaching with hollowed gaps between the fingers you once spanned. Over time the weeds I now rested in became hungry, swallowing me into the dirt. I am consumed wholly to this prison now save for the hand that reaches, reaches for a place that has long since forgotten.