Remember pacing the corridors
at seven AM,
planning our futures and
pondering our setbacks?
The year we were separated
into different classrooms,
I fought to have you back
sitting beside me.
Time raised us into women,
allies until,
I had to depart.
You cried nervously.
“I won’t let you go,”
I promised and took flight
to the other end of the world.
But FaceTime and Skype
couldn’t keep up with our lives.
Our partners never met.
Our kids never played.
Mutual dreams drowned
in the impassable, cold
ocean between us,
choking the chatter,
the curiosity, the sobs,
stifling our friendship.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 24, Issue 2.
Maryam Shadmehr is an emerging writer who lives in Emeryville, California with her husband and daughter. Her work has been published in Masque and Spectacle. You can find her at https://maryamshadmehr.wordpress.com/.
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