this last goodbye is not the same
as others that we spake,
in the spring of our youth when the apple blossoms smelled so sweetly.

these words are not ours
(which were dirty and familiar)
but forced plastic phrases, the excuses of downturned eyes.

"we'll see each other again i'm sure"
is what i say before your head finds my shoulder.
it's habit, routine, cliché, and that makes it all the more damned real.

today you are the reason
my life has meaning and form,
because these pangs of mortality reassure me that love exists.

let stand this proud monument to our finity,
in the ashes of happiness and fulfillment,
and, indeed, smile:
for with time we must, to every traveller on the boulevard of life,

bid some last bittersweet farewell.