⚠Trigger Warning: the following poem contains religious allusions that some might find offensive⚠

Memories belittled by dust,
preserved, taxidermal fashion
inside an anthology
of vintage photographs.

Though,
I am aware that  
"vintage"
is only a euphemism  
for a possession
that was once beautiful.  

Your treason
has turned all the photographs
ugly,  
their corners curling up  
like the spiral of a chameleon's tail.  

Vivacious colours devolve
into lacklustre,  
sepia tones,
blending in with  
the palette of my
surrounding melancholy.  

Ensnared in a dilemma:  


Do I miss you?  


or  


Do I hate you?  


(perhaps a bit of both,

but never

I love you--


not anymore.)  


Apertures mewl,
bruising the gallery walls
with tears.  

I frame your
betrayals
with gold and
garlands of daisies
in an attempt to soften  
our past  


(it never works).  


These
vacant
hallways
trap your phantom footprints
beneath the cobblestone.  

Was it really  
such a guiltless task  
to walk away from me?

Embedded  
across the rungs of my spine
are the scuff marks  
from where you wiped the dirt  
off your boots only after
wrenching the welcome mat
from underneath me.  

I have accepted that
our friendship was
merely transactional
to you;  

I served up  
all the love I had to  
give
like John the Baptist's head
was served up upon a silver platter.  


You feasted  


while


I starved.  


Yet,
full is this menagerie
of lost things.  

I know
I should burn  
the polaroids
in the name of closure.  

Perhaps
I am just afraid there will be no art--
no poetry--
left to sculpt
from the cinders that
remain.

I just want you to smile
And not say a drivel

As if you're an embellishment
Hanging on a wall
Where I can fix my eyes

Like you're a cliff
At the edge of the ocean
Every shutterbug's dream.

I want you
To open your mouth
Just to show your braces
Because that's how
You attract magnets

Never speak your mind
As if you're a doll
I cannot play.

I only want
The taste of your smile
And not the words
Of your lips. I lied.

there were cups and the sunset
but you never saw them, really
no you never saw them at all
till there were filters