Fading Away

There are no long goodbyes
Just a strange fading sensation
As if that part of your life
Never really existed.
You begin to feel like a ghost
In some Hollywood film –
You’re talking to people
Attempting to grab their attention
But nobody is responding;
You are just thin air
Swept away by the innovative breeze:
Slowly the babble of conversation
Slips away into the stratosphere
And is lost in a swelling mist
Of confused thoughts and memories.

Then you realise that you still exist
And smile
And move on; forgotten by many
Remembered by a few,
A discarded password
That flickers like a dying star
On a computer screen.
This is life – a series of goodbyes
And greetings,
Out of light into darkness
And back into light;
Flitting like a butterfly
Back into a sunlit world
Full of birdsong,
Quartering the silence
Of fond recollections.