woven widget
There is betrayal in the air tonight.
Not loud, not with trumpet nor blade,
but quiet tender, treacherous like
a whisper from a ghost in a locked room.
The bottle still sits where I left it,
cap half-cocked, like an old soldier’s hat
tipped in salute to a memory
that no longer salutes me back.
I knew what I was doing.
I knew before I touched it.
The weight of it in my hand—
how absurdly heavy it felt
for something so light, so vaporous.
I should’ve let it gather dust
like the rest of your absence.
But I pressed the silver trigger.
Twice.
That was all it took.
And at once
the air tore open.
That accursed sweetness.
Pineapple leaf,
lemon God, that lemon
like sunlight filtered through your hair
the day we sat on the bridge
and you said you couldn’t stand
how most men smelled like arrogance,
but this...
you liked this.
You leaned in.
Your nose brushed my neck,
and you said
“This feels like you.”
Like me.
And I remember
how my breath... forgot itself.
Then—
the red apple arrived.
Not real, no never real,
but something imagined,
like the warmth of your fingers
hovering,
just above the skin of my wrist.
It burned me then.
It burns still.
Even now,
the scent plays its cruel theater
across the stage of my lungs,
and I watch it
as one watches a lost child
call out to a mother
who will never return.
Do you understand?
This is not cologne.
It is damnation in liquid form.
It is your voice
in the dark hour before waking.
It is your absence
made aromatic.
grave maple