Ghost

All those whom I’ve known 
are dying now,
dropping like flies,
evaporating like disappearing ink,
leaving nothing behind.

It’s a strange thing to live long
while everyone who gave your life
context
disappears.
Where is the context, then?
If no one remembers that you won
the Pulitzer Prize,
the home run prize,
the hotdog eating prize,
then did you in fact ever win them?

You can’t say to some young lady
over dinner,
“Did you know I won 
the home run Pulitzer hotdog eating
contest in 1939?”
because, believe me, she doesn’t care
and she doesn’t even know
what they are.

Context is what gives our lives meaning.
Without it, we are ghosts.
Without someone to turn to and say
“remember when we ate watermelon 
by the river and Billy caught his hair on fire?” 
it simply never happened.
Memories only exist when 
the people you shared them with
exist.

I am a ghost now,
rattling these halls at midnight,
floating through these cities,
longing for a time when
someone remembered me.