It drags its hands across the roofs,

through the trees,

through the hollow places between my ribs,

until every song becomes background noise

to something older,

something that has never learned

how to be quiet.

I stand outside,

porcelain skin collecting the evening

like a fragile cup.

The air smells of cigarettes

and my body lotion—

sweet and chemical,

the scent of a life brushing against another

for only a moment

before disappearing into the dark.

And suddenly I miss everyone.

The ones who left.

The ones who died.

The ones who are still alive somewhere

but no longer belong to my days.

I miss their laughter

in ways I cannot explain,

as if memory were a room

and I keep returning to find

the furniture covered in dust,

the windows shut,

their voices fading into the walls.

The wind keeps talking over the music.

Maybe it knows something.

Maybe it knows that every song ends,

every cigarette burns to a filter,

every bottle of lotion empties,

every body softens back into earth.

Maybe it knows

that one day my name will be spoken

for the last time.

That one day

this porcelain skin will crack,

these hands will let go of everything,

and the people who love me

will search for me in old photographs,

in forgotten messages,

in the smell of rain on a cold evening.

The thought should frighten me.

Instead,

I listen.

The music grows distant.

The wind grows louder.

And for a moment,

surrounded by ghosts,

by smoke,

by sweetness,

by all the people I cannot keep,

I feel strangely grateful

to have been here long enough