Open Letter to Erin

I think of you more often than I’d like to admit,

I think of the better times, before we changed

into who we probably both are today.

 

I think of

                our sisterhood sharing a room,

                the collages of lyrics on the wall

                that meant oh so much to our existence.

 

I reminisce

                of the quiet breakfasts we’d cook

                together, the times I cried my heart out

                in your arms or the times you turned to me

                when was no one  was left.

 

I know that feeling now and I can’t say

if I regret the parting of ways,

I felt neglected as your life became your own.

My shadow, finally belonging only to me,

 

You, standing free, beautiful and a mother

 

You, distant and able to pass judgment on me.

Me, who never condemned you once

for all the heartache you carelessly caused

me through the years.

 

 I didn’t have time to

mourn the loss, I was too busy

living in an abusive cycle that eventually

dried out.

 

It has almost been four years.

 

I’ve heard your name, your latest marriage (the third to date),

all of which, you ensured I would miss.

I have eagerly listened to stories of your daughter grow.

 

I ache knowing,

thinking

this was the desertion I’d deserved

 

In solace hours, I realize we

still hold the darkest secrets

between ourselves.

 

I try to neglect the desire for nurture

the way we complemented one another

or the way we could self destruct,

repair and continue on,

thinking we had forever to get it right.

 

I can’t say, won’t admit,

I regret the decisions we made.

 

I just know, I miss the friendship

                your smile, the long length of your angry eyelashes,

                the easy stride we had with one another,

                our seven a.m. visits to the cemetery,

                the ability to dial your number by heart

                and know you’d always pick up the phone,

                the way you knew with me there was always

                a way home,

 

In the course of the years passing

I’ve grown sober in understanding so much

and yet this area always remains so gray,

and desolate,

 

how is it forever collapses in one day?

 

 

Author's Note

This poem is written about my former best friend. We were friends for 17 years. After four years I sat down and wrote this.

Reviews

[cest la vie]

Lola, Lola.. this can not and will not be reviewed by me.
I can say that you have taken the high road because you have so painfully and honestly shared your friendship with us, the reader. One never knows the hows and whys of these things, but one can continue to carry the tenderness in that little side pocket that all hearts have.

[there is no more from m..]

what a grate poem it is truley amazin :)

[Kleinmenn]

A desertion deserved
who can ever know
only the pain is for certain
the tears real
the shattered glass
never to be rebuilt
in the same form
perhaps
each piece scattered apart
forever eternity
words of solace
from a stranger afar
one creature
to another
living beings united
by
our existence