your hair is beautiful.

it shines like the sun does on days when you feel warm for the first time in months.

and when you walk, it caresses your shoulders with such purpose that i know you never feel alone.

you arms are long and defined,

the skin a dark olive that reminds me of the sand on my favorite beach.

toasted brown from the kiss of the sun.

your back is strong, and some god ran his finger along the center of it.

you stand tall, and i know you are holding up the weight of the world,

but you look so beautiful doing it.

your legs look sturdy, as they carry you long the side of the river.

they overtake such obstacles with no falter, and you seem to float along the walkway like a cloud lost in the beauty of the world.

your feet are small, and seem so vulnerable to me.

the tender skin against the rough of the earth,

yet they never bleed.

i want to touch them then,

feel the soft skin against my cracked and torn fingers.

i walk faster, then start to run, as i reach out to you.

my feet lose there footing and i stumble over and over again, yet i continue to run.

faster and faster, yet you still seem so far away.

i hold out my hand, so close to your shining hair.

as i get there, my fingers pressed against your back and my breath heaving in my body, i begin to turn you.

please, i beg anyone, let me see your beautiful face.

my fingers tremble and my stomach rises quickly,

for this is the moment when i’ll see you.

when you turn, i gasp.

my eyes drop, and my fingers go numb.

underneath the curtain of satin hair, sitting among the caressed shoulders and carved back, leading the strong arms and soft feet,

lay nothing.

a blank canvas, disregarded and forgotten.

an absence of so much that it all turns dark.

the beauty disappears

and all there is is me,

holding the forgotten remains of what used to be.