to love a ghost
inspired by “Spirit Hold” made by artist Holly Warburton : https://www.instagram.com/p/B4t7HqMDdpR/?igshid=1a46g1m2hhive
What do you do with a love that just is?
A love that knows no care that it does not have a body to reside in? A love that is not a wanderer, nor an adventurer, it is always in the same place yet the world feels like it’s spinning and twisting around them, they seek a sanctuary that remains no more than what it once was.
A love where you’re always reaching in a dark cave that swallows you whole. The hands you wish to be there never holds out theirs, you are holding the damp air where they used to be. It’s endlessly walking and waving your arms, and you get nothing but the longing that goes to your stomach and lives there like a hunger that cannot be relieved. What coarse through you is no longer blood, all that you are is a big question mark.
You are not a wanderer, you are an idiot swept by the tide with the most darling smile and now stranded where they took you, no knowledge of the way back.
But love, as we know it, persist and never ceases in places even stranded from any sign of life. This one does at least. It blankets you, it is there whether it’s echoed back or not, whether you’re carrying it yourself with all your might or dragging another soul to carry it with you. When the firm hands that were once the hands that carried your body weight through twisters you created yourself now hold you like water in their hands… what then?
When the love died but not the body, how do you mourn the ghost of somebody alive?
How do you mourn a love that is no longer, when the laugh you long is still one sarcastic joke away to be heard, yet when you plead you get nothing but a pity-flavored friendly smile that pats you in the head before leaving?
How do you love, despite? And how do you get rid of it? Because it’s in me, it’s the love that carries me to sleep and what shows me that there are still beautiful things.
But to love a ghost is not a pretty thing. To love a ghost is to be willing to love the echoes of your own voice sending back the proclamations of affections. To love a ghost is to love the parts of you that they brought with them when they left, even when they remain no more. To love a ghost is to burn every night and nothing to do but to let yourself become ashes every morning. To love a ghost is to long, with no ability to expect, plead, beg, and walk away.
To love a ghost is to despise yourself.
