We stand on two opposite sidewalks. We dare not cross to each other. All that remains for us now— Memories! Let's turn...and walk away. And our fists, clenched in helplessness, we turn our backs on the memories, and they pierce us like pins, our hearts bleeding from the wound. But we know we must not linger! Each of us has learned to lose. And the feeling that devours us— tomorrow, we will learn to love our solitude. Goodbye...Or should I say it? No, I'd rather say nothing at all. I cannot speak that word! One last glance...Then nothing. And please...I hope you didn't see how tears gathered in my eyes... I don't want you to remember me that way! This last smile...is yours to keep.
# Farewell I do not know what word might serve— the one that closes doors without a sound, that lets you slip away like smoke between my fingers, like water through cupped palms at the edge of thirst. I have rehearsed the grammar of goodbye a thousand times, conjugated it through tenses that do not yet exist, but when you stand before me with your coat already buttoned, your hand already reaching for the knob, all my careful sentences scatter like startled birds. What is left then? Only this: the space between us growing, the space where words once lived, and your shadow crossing the threshold, crossing into a season I cannot follow. I do not know what word might serve. Perhaps there is none. Perhaps we simply turn, and let the door speak for us— that ancient, necessary sound, closing.
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