A Letter for You to Never Read

You said to me, on that late summer morning, “I don’t see a future anymore,” and that was the end. But I still see it, sometimes, when the lights are out and no one’s around. I see a couch that’s big enough for both of us and your hand in mine. And I see us growing old but not apart.

I think about crystal balls and wonder whether they might show the future, just not the right one. Because I know you’re not coming back. But I am a heretic to my own orthodoxy. So instead I watch, in the dying light, the candles of our forgotten ceremony slowly burning out.

I think of memories and wonder if you’re watching them too. I think about the future and if you’ll be in mine at all. Then I think of death and a sort of panic sets in. I think how you might not know if I’ve died, and I’m reminded of forgetting an assignment the day it‘s due.

So now I'll come to know you as the sun: from a great distance, in shadows and reflections. And, at the end of it all, I feel certain I will forestall Death and let you know that I’ll be gone, in some way, just in case you wanted to know.