So you face Mecca five times a day
Muttering my name under your breath.
So you remember the nights and days
When your hands kept me from falling,
You pulling my weight from my coarse palms
And weak fingers.
You remember the seasons we reigned,
Ruling the world with straws, wielding lollipops
And cotton candy in our hands,
our own king your own queen.
We promised each other fortunes
only they were cut out of paper,
adorned with sketches of us
And I swore I could catch the last firefly
that glittered after dawn.
But suddenly it’s a real world. The castles were built with sand,
Our faces rid with pimples,
our hands separated by distance
You say I am not who I used to be;
my voice a tone deeper.
But I only see your own chest heavier.
Suddenly the mention of my name
is forbidden in your sanctuary
The same name you scribbled
behind your notebook in biology class
and wherever there was a pencil and paper,
where there was a nail and a tree,
where there was a finger and some sand.
You pick on my weakness and forget
That its the same thing that we are made of;
that which makes us one.
You forget we were formed from the ground
The one we step on. You forget our mortality,
The topic we never brought up.
Friend, we are so lost. Tell me,
Are these wounds we can mend?
Or is this a chance to pretend
Again that we are not friends
but strangers
