"Cryptic in Mentality"

The song throbs through my headphones and into my ears, reawakening my memories. Tired feet travel wearily over this same old sidewalk, these same old streets that we once walked together. My eyes search the cement vainly for a particle, a molecule, a single lucid memory of you. It is, so far, a futile search. As I walk my mind sorts through the washed out words of the past, grasping at straws for some sense of familiarity, but finding only a void.

A vague sense of nostalgia spreads through my every nerve and vein, pumping through my body with each beat of my dying heart. A sudden rumble resounds overhead and rain is released on these God-forsaken streets in torrents, drowning me in a sorrow that I'm not entirely sure is solely mine. Fog springs up around me and envelopes my body in its cold fingers, and I hold my arms closer to myself, trying to warm my rapidly numbing flesh.

It is only when I realize that the rain tastes faintly of salt when I discover that my tears have joined the downpour. Slowly, I trek to the place where we once went, and I'm almost choked by memories of you.

I have found what I was looking for.

Sinking to my knees, I am heedless of the mud and dirt sullying my clothes. My mind empty of everything except you, I allow the tears to flow freely.

You never knew how much I cared, did you? You will never know this ritual that I perform with each passing year, this visit to the past where bottled emotions are set loose to reign for awhile before being corked and tucked away once more. Until next year.

My mouth opens and I hear myself singing softly, one of the saddest songs I have ever known, and one that reminds me infinitely of you. My senses are filled with you now... the way you smelled, the way you tasted, the touch of your fingers...

Pain like I have never experienced before crashes through my soul, and it is then that I finally and fully understand... I understand the force drawing me to this place again and again, the compulsion to sing this never-ending song, the tears that trickle from my eyes like the rain that tears from the sky....

I love you.

~*~