In the sunlight

& then when I awoke the morning light made me choke as I remembered how the gentle susurration blended with the birdsong & the light began to curve like the branches above us to touch, briefly, skin within which poison blends with pollen & flowers blossom before I pluck them to place in your hair where they will wither & die.

The past still lingers in the present, & refuses to leave with the grace of living things.

This is what regret means: never to forget someone or something; knowing of all the lives that could have been;

to touch, briefly, your skin

for the last time.