Prompt:

There’s a picture of you somewhere that I don’t know where you keep But I still see it every time I can’t sleep You taught me how to shut a door without making it a sound So now I disappear so quietly I scare myself You say “I’m proud of you” like it’s something you forget to mean Like a line you read but never learned what it could clean And I keep every version of you I thought I’d get Like a promise that you almost didn’t break yet And I tried to be the kid you’d finally stay for But I learned you don’t knock when you don’t want the door So I’m standing on your side of the street again Like maybe this time you’ll remember when I was small enough to fit inside your hands Before you turned into a stranger I still call “Dad” You love in fragments, in half-returned calls In apologies that never really fall And I learned to translate silence like it’s language I should know Like if I listen close enough you might accidentally show But you don’t You just drift Like I’m a chapter that you skip And I write you into stories where you finally pick me first Even though it always hurts And I tried to be the version you’d defend But you only show up when it’s easier to pretend So I’m standing on your side of the street again Like maybe this time you’ll remember when I was small enough to fit inside your hands Before you turned into a stranger I still call “Dad” I don’t want a perfect man, just one who stays Not a ghost in a house that he helped make And it’s cruel how I still miss what never really was How absence can feel just like love If I stopped reaching, would you even notice? Or am I just a habit you outgrew in slow motion? So I’m standing on your side of the street again Like maybe this time you’ll remember when I was enough before I learned to bend Into someone easier to forget I don’t know how to leave what never held me tight But I still wait in the driveway of your might-have-been life And I hate that I still hope you might Look at me like I’m yours tonight I walk away slow Like I always do But I still leave the light on In case it leads back to you