I. The Fall

I built a home within your arms, 

where laughter danced like candle flames, 

where whispered vows in midnight dark 

were etched upon my fragile frame. 

You spoke in verses soft and sweet, 

each syllable a silken thread, 

I wove them into tapestries 

and laid them where I laid my head. 

But love can be a fleeting ghost, 

a specter wrapped in silk and gold, 

it hums a tune so bittersweet— 

a song that sings of love grown cold. 

II. The Breaking 

One day, the silence swallowed you, 

it lingered heavy in your breath, 

the space between us stretched too wide, 

each word we spoke felt close to death. 

Your fingers, once a sacred touch, 

became a phantom brushing past, 

your eyes no longer saw my soul, 

but searched for echoes of the past. 

You loved me once, I know you did, 

but love is not a thing that stays— 

it drifts like embers in the wind, 

it fades like light on winter days. 

III. The Storm

I begged the sky to bring you back, 

to wash away the hollow ache, 

but love will not return to hands 

that only ever learned to break. 

The rain came down in whispered grief, 

it carved my sorrow into stone, 

each droplet sang a requiem, 

a hymn for all I’d left unknown. 

I screamed your name into the wind, 

it carried echoes back to me, 

but echoes are just ghosts of sound, 

and ghosts are not the ones we need. 

IV. The Ghosts

You linger still in empty rooms, 

a shadow draped in memories, 

a name that burns upon my lips, 

a love that haunts my fragile dreams. 

I see you in the coffee shops, 

in strangers’ laughter, lovers’ hands, 

I hear you in a melody, 

a song we danced to, now unmanned. 

But ghosts are cruel, they never leave, 

they carve their names into your bones, 

they whisper secrets in the dark, 

and promise you you’re not alone. 

V. The Healing

Yet time moves on, though slow it seems, 

it stitches wounds with golden thread, 

it teaches hands to hold themselves, 

and hearts to mend the words unsaid. 

One day, your name won’t taste like grief, 

your touch won’t linger on my skin, 

one day, the echoes fade away, 

and I will learn to breathe again. 

For love once lost is not the end, 

but just a lesson left to learn— 

to rise from ashes, forged anew, 

to build a fire that will not burn.

This was written by our contributing writer, Alisha Blanch.