The Poet and the Girl

I am blank.

There should be more

but where have I gone?

Where is the poet

who stormed the walls,

who chalked the sidewalks

with her unwavering words?

All those long roads with cascading cliffs

stealing her thunder, tearing her heart,

laughing at her emptiness.

All those many years with dark alleys,

dead cats, marauding tumults,

and now time etching wrinkles

into her face, her mind, her journey.

Where the hell am I?

The poet once upon a time

who loved and lived words of magic,

who had begun breathing

along the highways of the leaf.

Is she me?

Am I her?

Can a soul wither and wrinkle?

Can thunder be resurrected?

Will I laugh when I am 90

and say,

Girl, you should have just let it all go . . . .