To the house with the yellow door
we never lived in,
the city I passed by,
the stranger I almost loved.
To the painting left in my head,
streaked with colours no hand
ever mixed,
the call I never made,
the song I hummed once,
then forgot.
To the child I never named.
There is a cemetery
not marked on any map,
where all the unlived lives lie:
the apology unsaid,
the poem unwritten,
the “yes” I swallowed,
the “no” I let rot on my tongue.
I light a candle tonight
for the almosts,
for the flicker before the flame,
for the ghosts
with no names to answer to.
Somewhere, they bloom—
delicate as breath,
wide as regret.
Robert Walker 