I carry the grief of someone who no longer wishes to breathe—
as if by holding his sorrow, I could trick death into forgetting his name.
He inhales despair like prophecy, eager to fulfill it.
And the thought of him dying slowly kills me too.

What is there left to live for,
if he—so woven into the fabric of my soul—ceases to be?
He is the reason my spirit clings to this world,
yet to him, I remain a stranger.
Perhaps a friend. Maybe. A shadow at best.

A friend willing to bear his sorrow,
to drink the same poison,
to drown quietly beside him.
A friend—
a stranger.

I don’t know him,
but I know too much.
I’ve read him like scripture, page by page, for years.
Memorized the annotations of his sighs,
the margins of his silence.
Still—he does not see me.
He has not read me back.