The House You Left On Poem by Klaren Madaka

*'The House You Left On'*

I still set the table for two,
even though your chair learned how to be empty.
I talk to the quiet like it's you,
and it answers back in all the ways you used to.

You said _"forever"_ like it was a small word.
Like it could fit in a text and not break anything.
Now forever is just the space between
me checking my phone and me putting it down.

I kept all the versions of us.
The laughing one. The planning-one-day one.
The _"I'd choose you again"_ one.
I didn't know I was supposed to delete them when you left.

The saddest part isn't that you're gone.
It's that I'm still here,
loving the ghost of a future
that moved out without me.

You took the sun with you,
but left the light on.
So I keep living in a home
that only exists when I close my eyes