When times were better -- before you met her and decided that love's string was only so long and not longer -- our arms were stronger so we held each other more tightly, cat's cradles weaved around us. It was then that you thought of me and said I will build you a memory palace and into it you packed the smiles you filled like balloons on the hard days, compliments arranged as tessellated tiles, the promises you gave to build better tomorrows. I walk through it now, past windows that let in the light of crashed moons. I walk through it now, through doorways that guard empty rooms.  I walk through it now, waiting for the stones to fall and bury me.