Or, well, what was on the other side of it.

For a long time I couldn’t see you. I could never run fast enough to catch up.

Sometimes I would sit on the side of the road, rest. Contemplate what it would be like to
finally
reach you.
                          I would dream about it as I slept among the thorns. It was easy enough to pretend that they were you.

-

Sometimes I think I catch a glimpse of you— way out there, mingling with the waves of the hills, like a mirage— vague, dimly seen at first.

It makes me happy.

-

I wasn’t quick enough. Too slow, always.

You must have grown inpatient with me.

                     I miss you. The distance craves your touch. I wonder what that feels like…

I call out to you. Every night, I swear. Cars come and go, but their shadows never look as good as yours did.

I’m still running. I don’t know why. I have no destination.

Did I ever?

-

I look for your face in the windows. How I imagine it, anyways.

-

Smoke out a window. Melancholy chords, fading away. Impermanence.

             An apparition— seen and gone.