Wishing Well Poem by Jayne McGaughey

I found you at the wishing well
facedown
stirring your hand through it like it was the sea
you threw your pennies in it
you kept wishing for the same thing

I think I saw you that night
you may not have been there fully
but I saw your face
and I wept aloud
because life came crawling back
and all I wanted to do
was to crawl into your arms and sleep
like the little girl I am inside

I wrote you long letters
no desperation found,
just love between the lines
maybe it only meant something to me
I talked and talked
time slowed like the ceiling fan when you're half asleep
I said some things I'd never say
but I said them
because when I look at you
the truth beckons me
and I say the things that rest inside of me

I saw you three nights ago and I yelled aloud
come back
that's when I realized all that's left of you
is a ghost that occupies my company

When I drink hot tea and lie down
you're not laying on the other side
when I sleep to dream
you've just become the shadow in the corner of my memory
when I scream out loud
you're not there to calm me down
when I stand alone
you're not the whisper tickling my ear
you're nowhere in sight

I find you at the wishing well
I think you and I are just a dream
cause we keep on kissing
and there's no noise
just clouds sleeping in the sky

I find you at the wishing well
you're facedown on the ground
head tilted to the side
you keep asking me what happened to who I was

And I can't stop weeping
because all I want is to crawl back to your arms
and sleep like the little girl I was when I first met you

We throw our pennies in
we give our wishes to the wind

we lie side by side and we attempt to dream
outside the lines of wrong and right