Scaffolding

I feel like I’m in a constant waiting game.

Waiting for you to let me in

Waiting to see you again

Waiting for, forever.

Time is suspended.

Miles stretch like elastic

Sound won't echo

Foundations remain scaffolding and

Everyone knows your name.

The phantom I’ve framed my future around,

Framed it for—

Like a piece of unknown artwork, with an unwilling muse.

Still, you hang on the interior of my mind.

Is this a requited feeling?

Do they know the artist or have I remained

a frameless picture?

Why does no one know you yet?

Why don’t I know you yet?

Why do I feel your soul welding into my own 

When I don’t know where you are?

The absence of you surrounds and follows me

Haunts me

But when I see you

I’m teleported to the space I wait for.

I hear the giggles becoming permanent,

Smell the pastries steaming the house,

Feel the void of uncertainty becoming whole again—

Scaffolding becomes a home before the walls are torn 

again

So why does forever feel like nothing when a few years feel like forever?

Words by Lisa Clark, she/her