“Do you remember this place?”, I ask as I sit down in the grass next to you.  You look over at me, the sunlight glinting off of your hair as a soft smile spreads on your face and kisses your eyes with warmth.

“I could never forget it,” you say.

   We both stare out across the pond, drinking in the setting sun in a silence that seems eternal and comforting.

“How long do we have?” I ask.

   You look over at me, smiling once again, but this time there is sadness in your eyes.  “Not long,” you say.

   I nod.

   I look over to the church, the light glowing off the whitewashed boards, and sigh.  Memories flash through my head.
Good memories.
Perfect memories.

   “Do you remember my vows?” I ask, looking over at you as you pick a flower out of the grass.  You nod, and smile.  “I stayed up half the night before our wedding, trying to find just the right words for that poem.  I had already picked out the frame and told the people that I wanted to put that picture of your parents with the poem up front. I wanted to make sure they were there, for you, even if they really couldn’t be. I thought I could just wing my vows.”

   You look at me, a single tear falling from your eye.

   “Once you were there in front of me, and the moment was there, I couldn’t think of a single thing to sum up what you truly meant to me.  So I said the only thing I could.  You are everything to me.”

   You take my hand, softly squeezing as another tear falls.  “It’s time to go,” you say.

   I look at you one last time, and lean over and softly kiss your lips, taking in the life one last time that I always wanted.

   “Goodbye my love,” I whisper.

   Then you are gone, and the last ray of light dies.

   Everything.

Picking up all the scattered pieces on the floor
It hits so hard this constant burning passion you choose to ignore
Overly tired of feeling like I’m the last resort
Wanting to find paradise, but everything seems all out of sort
Falling for you ever so effortlessly, but my heart doesn’t cross your mind
I feel as if, I surely lost you this time
Though I know that you were never mine
The fact that my absence doesn’t bother you even the slightest makes me wonder if my presence even mattered at all in the first place
As I slowly start to let go of the illusion that things could have been any different my head starts to race
You made me feel like a waste of space

i do not really understand
who you have become
why you have changed.
what used to seem so real, so clear
is gone.
talking to you is like
speaking through a
foggy
thick
translucent window
where the full picture is distorted
and i never know if you are fully understanding.
i don't want to lose what we have
but i don't know if you truly care

"come back” i whisper.
"come back” i say.
"come back” you hear.
"come back” i plead.
"please, come back”

Ode to being gone.

I was riding o the high.
when the voice sank.
Muddled
& confused.
Reaching from unknown waters.
Beds placed in orders.
& disorders.
Wrapped upon a red vessel.
A girl.
Placed out of Her known waters.
& subtly coughed upon dining room tables.
She the contender.
She the rose no marry.
She the lovely wearing flannels in bed.
& she to touch the flower within your soul.



Garrett Johnson.

I wear an old shade of red.
My belly is a wrinkled
skin of fruit.
I am no longer a ripe peach,
not even a blossom.
That my daughter is.