Chilling, sterile, recycled air

enveloping me like a thin blanket on a wintery night.

Bright, cold, hospitalic hallway … it

It didn’t seem this cold before.

It wasn’t this cold before.

It wasn’t this cold back then when

we were here. Every day.

Hazy wisps — echoes.

Echoes of moments lost to time

Ghosts haunting me

with what was, with what

only could have been

if I had just had a

little bit more

time.

The echoes are echoing.

The ghosts are haunting me

through the bland and lonely scenery

under which they were born

Unchanged and poised to relive it all over again if given the chance.

Which it won’t.

It’s not the same anymore.

No one to sit with backstage in the dark,

No more eyes to drown in,

No more looks from across

the room to make me 

slip into daydream.

No.

This hollow shell,

this empty, frigid chamber of fantoms, this

stagnant time loop making a mockery out of my youth —

is now my only link to the warmth of before.

A personal hell of my own subconscious maintenance

Where not even my dreams are

safe.