You waited for me
Three in the morning,
By my stairs
standing there
holding time like it was yours to give

We talked until the sky bruised with morning
Not with words
But
Breath and Eyes

You never asked for more,  
but your eyes—God, your eyes—  
they begged me to stay

I wanted to
I wanted to let you trace the outlines of my lips
to let your hands teach me something softer than distance
But I couldn’t

So I let you hold me, just once
long enough to know what safety felt like
short enough to make it hurt

I had to go back
to someone who wasn’t waiting for me
back to a loveless love I had promised
back to a night that should have been ours
but never was

You wrote to me once—  
a goodbye I read too many times,  
And I still hear it
like an echo that never fades
like a door I never opened
like a life I almost lived

Do you ever think of me?  
Do you ever wonder how the night would have ended  
if I had let my heart win?  

Because I do
I think of you
in cities where no one waits for me
in the spaces between three in the morning  
and forever

And sometimes, I go back
To that street, to that moment
as if the past might fold itself open  
and place you there again

I stand where you once stood
where the streetlights flickered against your skin
where your voice tangled with the night air

I search the faces that pass me by
hoping for a shadow shaped like you
for a glance that lingers, for something
anything  
that says you still remember too

But the night is silent
the city indifferent
and you are nowhere to be found  

Before I said goodbye
your breath lingered on my lips
warm, uncertain—  
a moment stretched between us
an eternity and nothing all at once  
I swear the world held still
just for us, just for that

Somewhere, in another life
maybe I did
Maybe we did
Maybe we never had to say goodbye at all