humus (root and wither)

Before you, the soil of my chest lay fallow, a quiet, settled dust. Then, a word, a glance a seed dropped from your hand, and hope planted itself, a foreign thing. At first, a warmth, a gentle unfurling, a root that tickled, then held. The first green shoot, a question mark pushing through the sternum. The vines grew thick, insistent, a sudden green fire in the dark. They wrapped my ribs in their relentless embrace, a map of every conversation, every shared silence. Each leaf a memory of your smile. Now, the tendrils squeeze my lungs, a beautiful, breathless ache. I am completely out of air, and completely full of you. But you are leaving. The door clicks shut, a final, hollow sound. The vines that held me up begin to wither, to brown and curl at the edges. The leaves, once vibrant, crumble to dust, scattering with every shallow breath. My chest, a garden turned to ruin, is heavy with the weight of what is gone. The last petal falls. And I am left with only the ghost of a garden, and the suffocating silence of an empty room.