Why Did You Come?

Why Did You Come?

– for the one who awakened, then disappeared

By: Somi Philip Chempothara 

Why did you come?

Why my door

when the whole world yawned open for you?

Why knock

so gently,

so insistently

until my walls, weary with waiting,

melted into welcome?

Until my name,

once ordinary,

began to sound like a love song

when you said it?

Why ask for room in my soul,

only to leave it cluttered

with the ache of your absence?

You came with quiet stories,

half-smiles that held whole lifetimes,

eyes that remembered things

I had never spoken aloud.

You walked in like someone

who had always known

where everything was kept in me.

And I?

I didn’t even try to impress you.

I was tired.

Frayed.

Still, you stayed.

And something soft

inside me

started to hope

maybe, just maybe,

this was that kind of love.

But then…

You left

No warning.

No storm.

Just

left.

Like a song

cut off mid-line,

leaving only

the silence

to explain itself.

And now,

I’m the one counting the hours,

measuring time by your memory.

I ask the ceiling,

the tea cup,

the wind,

the sky:

Why did you come?

To show me what I was missing?

To love me for a moment

and ghost me into forever?

If you had stayed away,

I would’ve survived.

But you came.

You lit the flame.

You made this house a home,

for a heartbeat.

And now it’s mine

this quiet,

this longing,

this flame

to carry

in the warmth 

of a flame 

You lit but never stayed to tend .

                        Ysomi