Last Rites

Sixteenth Day it is,

I have painted your room

But feel your presence still

I have changed the bed, moved the furniture

But still unable to live here.

Your footsteps are everywhere.

Your books knowingly smile at me

The last one is unfinished

With your cigar scent on it.

You possible know

All the time

I  use your phone,

In an effort to reach you.

I sit in your room and stare at the ceiling

Wondering what thoughts you had

On that fateful night

All still so surreal, raw, and a knife in my heart.

I have kept your bike

I don’t like anyone else on it.

I have hung a picture of you

In your room, it is painful.

Tonight, I am alone

Missing you at the balcony,

Where you often stood, 

with a smile and cigar

I look up to the sky,

The stars appear to smugly smile

Reminding me of your win

Over our last game of scrabble.

Tonight, I can’t help but remember,

When we were ten and twelve,

How much you loved the Mill on the Floss

And wanted to give it a different ending?

Tonight I know its true when they say,

He only takes the best.

In every snake and ladder

That we played, you hated to lose

You loved to see me cry, and then called me a baby,

But Leaving a game midway was never your style?

Why then have you just left me during halftime,

Until we meet, wherever we meet

It will be my turn to roll the dice

And make you cry.