Ghosts Poem by Vonnie Postit

when people leave
they mark their path with ghosts.
nothing else.
im not talking about undead
im talking about our favorite restaurant,
packed to the brim.
today i went alone for the first time
i wore headphones and a stern expression.
the waitress who adored you looked so
concerned when i asked her to make
the order to go.
i talked in short sentences
using hard words.
i could only afford to make eye contact
with my lit cigarette and
the stool thats pressed against the wall.
that stool was probably still warm from you.
the stool where you would look at me
as if i were wonderful.

i ran back to my room, only to realize
it was more crowded than the
restaurant.
the neosporin you left on my bedside table
looked like a dagger.

i am so mad at you.
i am so mad that when i look in the mirror
i can only see you in strobe lights behind me.
im so mad that when you kissed
me this morning, it felt like breathing.
now it is too crowded in my room to
feel anything other than stares.
you left our tic tac toe game sitting on my desk.
do you remember that day?
the day we lost ourselves in one another
and pretended not to notice?

i'm so mad that when i touch my body
i hate the feeling of my hands because they don't feel like yours.
i hate you for leaving and i hate myself for
wanting you to stay.
i never thought i would find myself
so deeply intertwined with so many different cliches—

boy adores girl.
girl breaks up with boy.
boy still adores girl.
girl finds she's made a mistake in the last moment.
boy adores girl and than is gone.
girl is left with nothing.
girl hates herself.
girl doesn't eat the day he leaves.
girl asks him to give more
knowing that he has already given more
than he should have.
boy is fine with that because he knows who he is
despite a heavy kind of dysmorphia.

i cannot see myself anymore.
i only see you, wearing my clothing,
lying in my bed, holding my face,
carefully, like a decaying rose.
this morning, i woke up to you
dressed in white like Jesus.
i do not want to go back to sleep.
the ghosts are all i have.
the ghosts are all i have.
the ghosts are all i have left.