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You can read this novella from the beginning through this link.

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I used to know every contour of your face,
The exact timbre of your voice,
The way your body pressed against mine,
Your taste, the salty scent of your sweat.
But your traces are flaking off my brain;
In the seams and margins of my memories,
Bugs and patches have appeared,
Corroding the integrity of a past
That I’m editing, shaping with bias,
As I revisit it time and time again.
Your gaze, your smile, your laughter,
They all fade away into oblivion
With each ticking second.

Izar, I beg you, stay with me.
Let’s leave this suffocating city
On a motocross odyssey spanning Europe:
Hundreds of kilometers of highways,
Speeding through the countryside
Past petrol stations, fields, and farmhouses.
We’ll make love on the shores of the sea,
Then sleep under a blanket of stars.
Let’s rent bikes and ride along the Seine.
Let’s explore the winding streets of Venice,
Swim in the turquoise waters of the Caribbean,
Surf the waves of Hawaii or Costa Rica,
Climb the ancient terraces of Machu Picchu.
For the rest of my days, I will care for you,
Your unstable mind, your fits of rage.

Forgive me these postcard destinations;
You dreamed in exact places: Ponts, Jerez,
A rundown cottage in Sierra Nevada.
I dream in the smudged colors
Of a map left out in the rain.

Growing up, I feared venturing far
From my neighborhood, from my parents.
I dreaded exposing myself to risky experiences.
In my mind, I saw my mother’s stern face,
Ready to scold and ground me
For daring to struggle against the vines
She had wrapped tight around me.
Roam the breadth of Spain? Travel the world?
Such adventures felt as distant as the stars.
I was convinced that even as an adult,
I wouldn’t organize something so troublesome.

But that year, I stood in the blazing Roman heat
With my teenage son beside me
And my daughter’s small hand grasped in mine,
Gazing up at the façade of the Pantheon,
Its towering Corinthian columns glowing faintly,
Burned by the merciless July sun;
Its triangular pediment pockmarked, scarred,
By twenty centuries of plunder and weather.
I longed to appreciate its grandeur in solitude,
But a throng of tourists choked the square.
A listless guy stood dressed like a centurion,
His helmet adorned with a plume of dyed horsehair.
The muscle cuirass concealed the flab
Of a modern man suited to a desk job.

The Pantheon didn’t belong in this post-apocalypse,
Among the disoriented survivors of the 21st century,
Who lacked the knowledge to recreate
The sunlit glory of their once eternal past,
And who had lost the will to rediscover it.

Well, what did you think about the sights, Izar?
We never had the chance to escape together,
But I carried your memory to Rome.
I hope you enjoyed the trip.

In my little corner of the world, whenever I could,
I escaped to the freedom of an isolated bench
Along the wooded lane containing your memorial stone.
There, beneath the sunlight filtering through branches,
Hunched over a notebook, I poured my memories of us,
Capturing in words every detail I could remember.
I discovered that writing tricked the brain
Into gilding moments and affixing them to its cells,
Regardless of their authenticity.

Drawing, writing, they couldn’t save me;
They just helped me endure this lonesome life
For yet another day.
But maybe the right words could save
What remained of you.

In my heart, a secret garden bloomed.
Pollen sparkled on iridescent flowers,
Their petals fanning out like peacock feathers.
In this floral realm where time stood still
And death could never enter,
You, enshrined within a poem or story
That wouldn’t fade, rot, nor be reduced to ashes,
Could live eternally.

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Author’s note: the songs for today are “This Is the One” by The Stone Roses, and “Sit Down” by James.