Sometimes I see photos of us
I recognise the girls smiling at the camera
But in the way you would recognise a celebrity:
You see them a lot
And bring them up in conversation
And you pretend to know them
But have barely scratched the surface
Of their existence.
Except, I knew these girls.
I knew you.
I don't know how we changed from being like
that
To whatever this is.
I knew so much more
Than these few
Saved fragments of time.
Now, when I imagine your voice
I refer to the distorted sound
From a short video.
I knew the girl in the video
Well, I'd like to think I knew her.
At some point
I must have known you, right?
I must have known more than a name,
More than a faded image,
More than a shaky video...
Now that I think about it,
I mightn't have known you at all.
I want to let go of you.
It shouldn't be hard to forget
Someone you never knew
But my mind has convinced me
That I saw something
In an unknown face,
That I could trust
A stranger
That constantly convinced me
That I knew them.
It is so easy
To delete a video;
To throw away a photo
But I still can't seem to throw out
My memories of a stranger.
What was implanted in my mind
Are false memories; illusions
Or something of the sort
I feel that if I throw away
These faded frames of memories
I'll throw away
The girl I knew.
But I want that,
At least, I should, right?
I keep telling myself
That I didn't know you
But the feelings I felt,
The blissful and happy times
Tell me otherwise.
I need to let go of the stranger
That inhabits most of these lines.
I didn't know her
I knew the girl I wanted to know.
I opened my heart
To someone I didn't know completely
If ever...
I told my secrets
To someone who knew more of me
Than I of her...
I found comfort
In an anonymous person
That gained my trust
And my secrets and love,
Gave me nothing in return
Other than an illusion of happiness and love,
Ended up breaking my heart
And I hers...
And now she is present
In the pictures my spilled ink depicts
Although she remains anonymous
To everyone who sees the ink
Including me.
I knew a name and a face
I knew the girl in the photo
I don't know you.
A.N. Thank y'all for 969 reads on this poem dump. I'd like to thank my family and friends for putting up with my bullshit long enough for me to reach this major turning point in life.