“I could if I wanted, you know?”
I pirouetted
Full tilt
The room on its axis
Spinning quickly

Wound up
Unwound top
Rhythmically synchronized
With my clenched gut

Transfixed as
You—
Who had traced the edges
Of me
Mapped me
Committed to memory –
Morphed quickly
Became unrecognizable

Your identity
Faded
An old photograph
Outlined and defined
You frame everything I am

Who once was a beacon
Is now a shadow cast
The coldest glance
A knife kissing
Cozying against my skin

Alive, you still haunt me
A shamble of what I thought
A ghost of a man
I’m
Creased
From your tricky hands

NO*
Ringing gunshot
Swimming through your ears
Tell me, please,
That’s why you couldn’t hear
I am just a trail of smoke
Dissipating now

An ember
When I once was a blaze
Smothered by  uninvited embrace
I am fragmented
But they say
Every phoenix
Rises from ash