doppelgänger

Doppelgänger by Agnieszka Szwengier

who are you

you drift away from me

like a leaf drifts from its tree

you drift you drift you drift

and if you were a traveler

you would be marco polo

adventurous and animate

spirit of flight

but i lied to myself and

told myself i had gifted you

had delivered you from hell

and we were poets

and we were princesses

and you were epic

and i was ode

and we were history

but we were children

sitting in a circle around the fire

listening to ghost stories

and scaring ourselves and

one another with flitting fingers

in the dark

and you in my imagination

though right there beside me

you were immobile

not in a state of rest

but in a state of paralysis

defying all axioms

and theories of relativity

defying gravity

and i was stone

and there was a girl

sometimes happy

sometimes sad

with stars in her eyes

and a cloud in her throat

and you were me

and i was you

but that was was

and no longer is

and i sit here

now

wondering who you are

but who am i

while you watch me

deliver myself to evil

and you watch me fall

and i tuck myself into this descent

as snugly as i can and you tell me

don’t go don’t go don’t go

and i see it in your eyes

that you want to follow me

and i see it in your eyes

that you are trying

to fight the emerging flames

and i see it in your eyes

that you are doing the arithmetic

when you are here

we are two

when you are gone

we will be one

and one

gone

and i wilt and dissolve

like flower stems in brackish water

and you float and flutter

like rose petals on a night stand

and you are earth

and you are heaven

and i am stone

and you are grief

and you are tears

and i am fall

from grace

eternal

irrevocable

original

and we are mud

and we are dust

and we are ashes

and you are spirit

and i am flesh

And We are One.