lost

Tattered and torn and more empty sack than stuffed bear he fell behind the bed, snagged in the space between the coldness of the bed and the sterile emptiness of the wall, stuffed deep into the shadow place where monsters dwelled.
Lost. We didn’t find him until I had forgotten that the emptiness was for him. 

Svelte and slinky and more strip of cloth than dress it landed behind the machine, in the place where socks hide and favorite sweaters shrink, where the nonessential elements of what wears us dwells.
Lost. I didn’t find it until I had grown out of the desire to be the girl whose name I cannot remember. 

Gorgeous and grotesque and more kaleidoscope than man he crawled into the me of yesterday, the one with the kohl darkened eyes and blood red lips with space in my tortured heart for him onlyandalways, the hole scabbing over without either of us being aware until the gorgeous fell away and then he was just grotesque and the place for him was gone.
Lost. I didn’t find it again until the photo resurfaced and we traced over the faces together. 

You were by the window in the parlor, soaking up the sun. You didn’t go outside. You didn’t want to darken. 
You looked at me when you said that, in the tone that you used. It sounded like sandpaper scratching a rusted can, horrible and grating and who could love a sound like that?
Your fingers were bony and cold and you pointed at the photo of all of us and you told me that I looked like your mother and that she was beautiful. I told you you were. I kissed you. 
I left. 

They call you lost. They say I lost you. 
I did not.
I left you there. In the sun. Alive. You were there when I left you. 
You left on your own. 
You left. 
I will not find you again.
But you are not lost.