CW: None.
I captured the sorrow you sent me
like a star
it burned my palm
when it promised to nourish
all I’m left with is this imprint,
blackened flesh,
starting to curdle and scar,
raw.
We took the St. Charles streetcar once,
wind blowing all around us
bell clanging
zooming past shotgun houses,
a blur of pink and blue,
saxophones and trumpets in the distance.
And then you went silent,
a ghost that faded into darkness without a word.
You left behind a miasma of blue smoke
as gashes split open across my chest, my back
and I stumbled, drunk with mourning
off the streetcar
and into a sea of orange diamonds glistening in the clouds,
rose and violet stretched across the sky.
I wrote this poem to capture the heartbreak a friendship that involved unrequited love, and the grief we hold for people who are still among the living but who treat us like we are dead or ghosts. It also captured my mourning for New Orleans during the onset of the pandemic when everything was locked down, how I felt cut off from this city that nourishes my spirit, and the painful doubts of if I would ever be able to return again.
