One day you’re twenty five and there’s a dark
shapeless shadow that appears around
your apartment
Your therapist says its a manifestation of all the
past versions of yourself,
your mom says you’ve always seen ghosts in your
closet
and your best friend says maybe you’re just lonely
The man that you fuck
-always in your place never his-
jokes that maybe we should move in
-y’know to keep you safe-
and suddenly you feel all of him inside you
his sweat, spit, and cum
boiling in your body.
The next day you’re a little bit older
and the shadow takes a shape
morphs perfectly
into all the desires you’ve learned how
to bury
Nothing will quench your thirst like a pack
of cigarettes
And nobody will love you like a glass of red.
The man calls you drunk one night
-he didn’t mean to but he was in your area and
he might as well-
Has your isolation given birth to a new language?
does your silence scream yes?
He’s ringing your doorbell
-always impatient always fast-
And you try to answer it but the shadow
-now shaped like a friend-
Has entered your body and doesn’t like the space past your door.
One day you’re twenty five and something years old
and you’ve stopped going to therapy,
don’t answer your mom’s calls,
and to your friend you’re always busy.
The shadow is now every molecule in your house
and you cannot breathe it out.
But one day you’ll be twenty six and you’ve
quit smoking once before
Lungs blackned but by God still work
You find that walls can be painted scaredly
and you’ve never really cared much for the
superstitious anyways.
