If you had lived

If you had lived
we’d be still talking
If you had lived
we’d be hanging out at our favorite café
If you had lived
I’d be visiting you in the nursing home
If you had lived
We’d still be creating memories together
But you didn’t live
You didn’t make it this far
with me
I am left to create
memories with other people
I am left
with memories of you
of us
I have memories
Because you once lived

My neighbor says she’ll be 91 next month. A quick calculation tells me she was born in 1928. And I remembered a friend I used to have, who was born in 1929. And started musing on the might-have-beens had she lived passed 73.

There are other might-have-beens, too, with other people.

Such is life.

It contains death.

And memories.