There was a man who once lived in your very house. In fact, his own bedroom was the one you sleep in every night. He lived and breathed; he was very much real. But what does it mean to be "real"? He was an animate being, that much is true. He was alive, more or less, but he was dead. He lived day after day just to live; he lived for nothing. His schedule was strict and monotonous, and it could never be changed. It still hasn't been lost, after all these years. His schedule lives on; I suppose you can call it his legacy. It's still in his house, your house; it's drifting in the air, absorbed into the walls. He had no life; he breathed for no other purpose than to stay, so to speak, "alive." The man's identity you ask? Why, this man is you. You died many years ago, when you stopped living for a purpose.

would you like to fall for me
we could fall like the rain
swirling and twirling past brightly-colored flowers
and splash upon the concrete
all broken and bruised
our limbs braid in the cracks
like the vines on a tree
squeeze life out of living
they wither and die
leaving bones in the breaks
the ones in the sidewalk
the children skip over
all of the relics of old
the bones of their fathers
from times of yore
a child bent down
to **** a pretty flower
a child stood up
with blood on their hands
and a bone by their side

listen to the empty room
hear the pained whispers
they are deep in the walls
in the patterned paper

the coldness of the air
is the coldness of their breath
this is what it feels like
to have nothing left

the creaks in the floor
are the aches in their bones
pain caused from
years of feeling alone

the color of their hearts
is the same as the grass
green with envy
and a jealous past