For my 15 year old self and someone else.

I found freedom in you.
Even if it was just moments,
I felt free from what I didn’t want to know about myself.

My mind is only a portal to other places I wish I could go,
but I keep returning to those moments with you,
during our younger years,
intruding on my memories as a stranger.
Those are my most valuable minutes.

I learned to like the color orange.
Warm like the sun,
burning like embers.
A juxtaposition from the nightly blues,
trapped in a world of pensive cycles.
I painted everything in orange after you, for you,
of course, on the canvas of blue.

In the sunsets that come in the year’s end,
the colors again returned to us,
with oranges sparks being overwhelmed by encroaching blues.
I didn’t look to the horizon.
I watched its reflections on your face,
seeing each color more clearly,
more honestly.

Under the dark skies past the sunset,
we danced in the glows,
in circles until we couldn’t.
Gasping for air,
weak from laughing.

In a field with trees far off to the side,
we became our own pillars,
monuments to what we overcame,
together,
knowing what grew out of us,
because of us.

I let your arms drape over me,
which soon became shadows that return to haunt me.
I felt them and feel them both the same.
Growing into each other,
while me, snipping off the roots,
poisoning the waters in anticipation.

In chilly dusks late in autumn,
I think about you and me.
How I felt unlocked,
like a labyrinth to explore.
Learning how much you meant to me –
what you still mean to me –
though I feel the colors are fading.

I go to the field alone these days,
becoming overgrown in thorny shrubs.
I turn myself and repeat the rituals –
A ceremony of remembrance,
of passion,
of affection,
of protest –
of incredible, unfathomable freedom.