Someone I Used to Know

Fourteen long and excruciating days I anxiously awaited your reply.
It finally came--crystal clear:
This was to be no more.
I understood, despite my bleeding heart.
We both went our separate ways
Save a few brief encounters,
Where you always somehow managed
To ignite the forbidden and forgotten flame (at least by one of us).
Why then have you had this power
Of staying forever embedded in my mind
And perhaps my heart?

Now I read about you as I would
an uninteresting matter-of-fact article
Or a biography of some neutral character.
You have become
A stranger
"Soulmates", were your last words to me,
Daring to avow this even to the man
of my dreams, my past, my future.
Where are you now, "soulmate"?
Are you synonymous to "stranger"?
Inevitable changes taking place, I know.
What was never meant to be
will never be.
Yet memories of you still plague me
Appearing, disappearing, circling
Relentlessly enticing
Captivating from time to time
Yet too far-gone;
Continuity escapes them
Sense departed
Fading pictures
And all that remains
Is "someone I used to know."


                                                                                             September 23rd, 1999