(Continues from Tasting Tears)

Life’s precious but porous, with bad and good
both absorbed, compliments and complaints stored
replayed and reassessed, they become food
’til time slides through our flesh, spent but not stored.

Then our lives bleed into life’s rusted drain
mixing with pain, swirling down to death’s plane.

Yes, I’m still here. Call me a sucker for a looker in white. Despite the wind’s urging, I stayed. I listened to death’s rattle and felt the last breath leave her lungs. In life, I was a rover, never staying over. But I’m still here with the crashing waves and the girl whose tears taste like misery and fine wine with a hint of chocolate.

Love ’em and leave ’em was my game. But I’m here. My transparent hand touches hers. Does she feel me? Her eyes are glassy and fixed on the storming sky holding its rain, waiting for the right time. Maybe her story affected the clouds, or her passing saddened whoever lies behind the sky.

And just maybe, I’ve gone soft in the head.

I let go of her hand, but I stay by her side. I never caught her name. None of the images I captured from her dying mind held any clues. Why did her story so move me? I should go, but I stay waiting for her to rise. What makes a ghost like me? If it’s tragedy, she’s known plenty.

But she lies there cooling, going rigid. No spirit rises, none I can see. Maybe she’s meant for a better place. I should go, but I stay, captivated by the end of her story even though she can’t save me. No one can.

There’s a story drifting on the wind or buried in someone’s heart. When I find it, I’ll be free.

Find the earlier parts of this series here.

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For OctPoWRiMo, 31 poems in 31 days–all part of one story. Watch me do it.
All 31 prompts are pictured below.

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