You’ll always be my melancholic touchstone, it seems—

the one I fold into every 11:11 wish.

The place my heart returns to

to remember

what it felt like to be almost chosen.

To be known

and still not kept.

And me—your mirrorball.
All shimmer and borrowed light,
spinning just so
your eyes can glow a little brighter.

I make constellations out of you.
Out of us.
Out of things that never quite exist.

And when the night ends?
I don’t.

I stay.

Still.
Abandoned.
A glimmer with no gaze to hold it.

Even in your melancholy,
you breathe life into me—
carelessly,
like it costs you nothing.

And then you stop.

You stop
once you’ve taken all the light you needed.

Because I’m not the one you love.

I’m the one who stays—
despite the quiet,
despite the knowing,
despite the melancholy
you leave behind in me.