a lesson in grief

[this was day 4 of escapril. prompt was: ghost.]

summer always brings back an emptiness, 
an air of melancholy; nostalgia that suffocates 
me lying with my back on the sun-soaked poolside 
pressing myself flat, to dry out, to harden 
just like the ground beneath me: rough and 
unrelenting.  

i used to come to your house every day and we 
went swimming here each year. the buzz 
of mosquitoes and honey bees like sms 
conversations. music from somewhere inside. we’d  
exchange glances and laughter and bowls of chips. somehow  
we would float beneath the crystal blue of early june.  

i would admire each stretch mark on your tanned skin. smile  
sun-dazzled, eyes like the water beside us: clear and 
deep and we’d stay saluting few clouds, clinging  
to honeysuckle stories and sore sun-burnt limbs. we would sit, 
cross our legs, hold our breaths: 

the silence a tale of summer hopes. sleeping  
un-tucked at night. and i loved the way you were a mess  
of faded old t-shirts. of holey jeans loose on  
your hips and i think of the last time i pressed my cheek  
to your chest, took in your scent: sweet and spicy. something 
simple filled with wanderlust.  

adventure hung in the air around you, soaked  
through you and ate you up: it seeped 
beneath your skin, took root in your heart. and i knew  
i’d lose you to summer one day. to the sweat glistening 
on your brow like a crown. the choke of  
hot afternoons in our lungs. heat waves they hit, and you  
would just tangle yourself in it. quiet laughter  
pressing through anything.  

you would braid flowers into my hair and kiss me  
so deeply i could feel your bones under my fingertips. 
we sang songs that taught us how to love 
and lie and i’d compare you to thistle because 
you were fast growing, drought tolerant and 
most importantly: resistant. your nectar 
of butterflies and bees rolling across my tongue. 

my sunflower boy, you were always found 
picking bouquets for me. bathed in floral chants, tanned  
under a blazing sun. you always basked 
in the light, shining through our eyelids like fireflies.  
you were always ears full of ocean waves and hands  
cupped to river songs, wonder scorched, soaked in faith. 

and now i am forcing myself to keep existing 
in my own skin with my back pressed to the poolside. the sun  
leaves it’s fingerprints on my skin, on your  
memories. my lungs break open and i cough, choke on 
every guilt-soaked sunrise. 

i watch the grass sway in summer winds, press  
my palms to my eyes to keep the ghost of you at bay. the smell 
of your hair: pool water and strawberries; and fire-kissed and eyes  
blue like the sky, dotted with white kites. and i think of 
your unending stories stolen by the sky, your 
sea-soaked skin and the way you heaved 
your last breath.  

summer boy, you solar flare love, you were 
the last of your kind. 

and all i can do now is reach for the sky, hands shielding myself 
from that beam of warmth, from that blaze of memory: shaking fingers grasping 
for your light as if the sun could give you back and i can feel it,  
so deeply behind my ribs, there’s something missing now 
and all i want is my summer back.