Jolt

I bump into men
who used to be boyfriends
long ago.

And now they stand before me
with icing on their eyebrows
and powdered, sparse hair
with eyes which used to be larger
and noses grown longer,
their once passionate lips now shrunken
into caverns of stalagmite teeth.

They squint and smile and say
how I haven’t changed
and I want to scream:
‘If I haven’t, then why have you!
Why have you let me down?’

See how time has bleached their faces.
And like ghosts from the past
they’ve come to pay respects
to the one who survived
preserved in full colour -
(except for some touch-ups here and there).

Who reminds them
of gallant acts
and raw, fiery nights.

Gone forever,
though I stand within their reach.

I guess I’m a walking deception,
I might have cheated a little,
but when it catches up with me
all hell will break loose.

Eva Collins