Remains

When you are no longer here

Your contours remain in the shadows

Compensating for raw nerves

Fresh abrasions have exposed

When the only pieces remaining

Are the cracked and broken parts

When the panels of glass shatter

I'll stop and gather up the shards

When my harried heart strings sever

Flying too close to the sun

I'll think about the fateful day

When all the tethers came undone

My swollen ankles are red and sore

From endless wading through the mud

The hallway mirror is smudged and stained

Streaked with calcifying blood

My nervous eyes squint and blink

To avoid the sting of trickling sweat

But I will never think about

The one thing that I can't forget

A dormant body wastes and withers

Gradually it bloats and decays

Until all that we can identify

Are the skeletal remains

Perusing through the scattered fragments

Of a life that used to be

Wondering just how all of this

Could be happening to me

Beyond the faint and faded pictures

Of well worn memories

Lie the questions challenging

Our once firmly held beliefs

When all that still woefully remains

Of yesterday's proliferating promise

Are the rotting, rusted gates

Of the blockade put there to stop us

That's when I can't help but grimace

Turning my gaze down towards the ground

While I ruminate about the cost

Of the blatant contradictions found

There are some things in this life

That we are forced to accept

But that certainly doesn't mean

That I ever could forget.