The Silhouette

Twenty-eight years is a long time to hold

The shape of a man in the palms of my hands.

I was twelve when the world turned suddenly cold,

And the hourglass spilled all its heavy, grey sands.

I remember the shadow, the height, and the name,

The way that the hallway would echo your stride,

But the flickers are changing, no longer the same,

Like a photograph left where the sunlight can hide.

I search for your voice in the back of my mind,

But the frequency’s muffled, the signal is low;

The words that you spoke are becoming refined

Into whispers of things that I used to once know.

Was your laughter a rumble? A sharp, sudden sound?

Did your eyes catch the light in a gold or a brown?

The details are sinking deep into the ground,

While I wear the weight of your absence like a crown.

It’s a heartbreak of silver, a grief made of mist,

To love what is blurring, to miss what is gone.

The father I knew is a ghost I have kissed

In the quiet, blank space between midnight and dawn.

I miss you, I say to the hollows and air,

Though your face is a map that I can’t quite retrace.

But the love is a tether that’s always been there

Even if time stole the lines of your face.