The Lost Child

I have walked in your footsteps for long enough to know what happens next,

I have followed you down the darkest paths, I have seen you failing life’s tests.

With your broad back turned to me, you do not even notice my frozen breaths,

You keep moving on quickly while I observe and place my unlucky bets.

I have watched you break promises like deadly storms break the driest branches.

I hear they fear you, so I guess I am lucky to have never faced your avalanches.

They call me the lost child, they even wonder if I have taken after you,

And my brazen silence frightens them more than the latest twisted truth.

I have lingered over you like cheap perfume for at least a few decades now,

I have been the only face you truly dread to notice in the greyest crowd.

But with your back still turned towards me, you have built a sense of false safety.

You think I am disappearing like a mirage,

Yet somehow my ghost feels closer to you lately.

-Jackie