Leaves

By: Eloise Arnold

I stare at the pavement
And pray it turns back time
I hope the concrete changes
And I’m back where I was before
When I belonged

The leaves on the pavement are not so different
From the leaves that used to fall
The chill in the air feels almost the same
As the chill I used to shiver from
The sounds, the smells
If I could let the feeling linger in my lungs
Let it sit beneath my tongue
Like unsaid words
Behind my eyes
I see the whispering memory of the past
Whisked away by time
Until it is nothing but a leaf in the wind