By Julian Matthews
Look at this desk:
I could’ve been the paper. You, the paperweight.
Pin me down.
I could’ve been this sturdy shelf. You, the books.
Held you up, when you slid.
Or maybe that one bookend of your to-be-reads.
Lean on me slanted like so many fallen dominos.
All these unfinished novels. The one story
you were so invested in that left you hanging.
The sequel you found wanting. The fiction of this life.
The weight of the unread world.
Follow the trail of unreadable cues.This abandoned journal.
The hobby that turned into a chore.
These gel pens that dried up. The fading colours
of all these precious memories.
Of you. The stationery we left stationary.
Frozen in time like the burn that turned into ashes
in my mouth the minute it was spoken.
And regretted.
All the words left unsaid after. Like dust
that now finds its way into every crevice
of this heart.
The poem that crawled into its own nook,
and never got sent. Folded and tucked
in the unreturned book.
Like a patient bookmark
caught between two pages:
Forgive and forget.
Both overdue.
First published in Lit Shark Magazine, Europe.
