There should be brighter stars tonight
Because I know the wind can't blow you back to me.
All the times I tried to peel you off my skin
To drown out the smell and the taste of you
To scatter your ashes far and wide
You were never really there.
How the little blue veins on your eyelids
Can become something ghostless
Was never answered.
Your shoulderblades are gone
as is the brown mole on the back of your
Right knee.
It is the loneliest type of theft.

Your kisses are no tattoo.
And though you tried to wear me
Like a finely cut suit,
you were always more appealing
nude.
Yesterday, you tried your keys at my locks
But you were already gone.
And the wind can't blow you back to me.

--December, 1999