if i went back,
stood in the park i called a home,
i would hear your worn-down
skateboard wheels barreling towards me. knocking me down,
your mass pinning me to the gravel car park
as your ghost passes through me,
eager.

i feel you grab my hand, like peter pan, to drag me
to your own neverland.
sun-splattered walls pull time to an unwilling halt.
i misremember the shape of our tomb, i enlarge its shrinking walls and see every blue-and-red inch coated in a thick golden facade
of safety.

i wish to stay in that death sentence.
in the twelve hours before the guilt kicked in, before you
punched my gut with truth.

the streets stained grey, i walk.
precariously placing one bandaged foot in front of the other.
the green looks yellow.
the gold turned to harsh white
that burns my skin to ash.
your memory lies, basking in its reign
over my blue-and-red brain, ringing with your influence.

i sit on dead grass, outside a house i wanted to call home.
i watch a light flicker off from inside a broken window.
your broken window on your broken room.
silver moonlight casts shadows of the days i held your hand.
i wonder if you see me smiling, just for a moment,
but you don't live here anymore.