Alone is When No One Notices You're Gone

Alone is When No One Notices You’re Gone

If lonely means invisible

then I am a cloud

wavering by

in the shape of a hand-held mirror.

I float through my rooms,

my feet the feathers

of my cockatiel who flew

through the bars,

slowly disappearing.

The only traces of me

are white streaks on my toothbrush,

long strands of hair

on my pillow,

a few crumbs

between the cushions.

If I am a ghost

then my heart is a box of old photographs

gathering dust under the bed.

They say the reason

a spirit haunts a place

is because they are stuck, that no one

on earth or in the next realm

is requesting their presence.

So this is where I hover:

in my loft above the living,

the chatter of my family -

messages in helium balloons

already popped by the time

they reach me.

I am left holding all

the little strings

that no longer connect

to any hands.

Julie Valin

Julie Valin has been writing poetry since the first Loverboy album came out. Her poems have appeared in The Black Shamrock, The Poeming Pigeon, Chiron Review, Red Fez, Rattlesnake Review, Primal Urge, and several anthologies & collections, including the Punk Rock Chapbook series by Epic Rites Press. She is also an editor, book designer and self-publishing consultant for her business Self to Shelf Publishing Services, and a co-founder of the celebrated after-hours poetry press, Six Ft. Swells. She surrounds herself with books, literary happenings, art, throw pillows, saltwater taffy, and her group of friends whom she performs with – The Poetry Crashers.