The Ghost

Dear Beloved,  

  I write this letter to the ghost of your lovely image and to the love we once carved onto the bench of what was Bishan Park. I write to your smile that shines with curiosity in the midst of the strange oddities of Muee; and your faux sleepiness that pushed the boundaries of your curfew and the wrath of your father's anger. I write to the ghost of that girl who recognized me across the indoor stadium in the midst of a religiously drunk crowd.

  I write to the ghost that I loved and have never learnt to stop loving. 

  It is with much irony that although I continue to find the vestige of you in every girl that I have come to love, you have changed completely. The you today carry a different smile and a different love. No longer do you blush at the words 'I love you'; that magic only works once. And you no longer fancy the grand idea of family that you once carry in the sleeves of your heart. 

  I know that you have changed, my dear, every ounce of my rationality tells me that. And yet, my heart continues to remember you. Your ghost loiters in the lyrics of Seal and that ridiculous one hit album by Avant. And even in the most unlikely places, my heart skips at the scent of DKNY's Delicious thinking you are near by, the same way I continue to hope that I will see you behind a pink rose bouquet. 

  As I fall in love with different women, I catch myself wondering if I have simply fallen in love with the parts of them that reminds me of you. In one face, I find the lips that felt like yours, and in another, the strange habit of scratching fingernails when we hold hands on the bus. 

  With the fading light of my youth on the horizon, I feel the spirit of primal love reaching for you once again. But alas, there is no one I can steal you from; that happy ending from a 90 minutes movie is nowhere to be found. And like Alexander, I sink back into a world that no longer seems wide enough without you. 

Yours,

Always