in dreams

I forgot to turn the air on before I fell back asleep.  I am not sure if it was my sweating that made me dream you were lying next to me, or if it was my heart needing to feel you again. I woke up damp, with the feeling I had been punched in the gut.  You are gone. Three words that have terrified me since I was a kid. 

I licked my arm to taste the salt and tried to remember what you tasted like, but I can’t.  I no longer see a big picture or a complete story, just little flashes.  All that's complete is what I have written. I contemplate hitting the delete key, wondering what any of this means to me now.  Often, rereading it makes me feel warm, other times it feels like being hacked with a knife. I want to judge myself for being such an emo.

I’ve tapped into why I needed you only to realize that I no longer do.  Coming to me in dreams about salted skin and swampy hair reminds me of why it didn’t work rather than fill me with desire.  Restraints come loose in dreams and I won’t pretend some of you isn’t still in me, but I no longer worry that you will always haunt me.