Nostalgia Poem # 785 (or thereabouts)

I sometimes want to go back
To the dim days behind,
To when I would wait beside the door
For you to come out and greet me with
Smoky kisses and warm arms,
Back to days when you would
Surprise me with mix tapes of
Music that I had never heard before
But would remember long after
You were gone and they were gone.

I still hear the music.
I still run across the songs on the radio.
I still remember your warm breath and
Your wet mouth and your deep eyes.

I miss the hope of futures intertwined,
The eagerness of walking across a
Frosted yard from my door to yours.
I miss all the brightness and beauty
Of the future I thought I had before me.

I want go back, but not for you--
I want to go back for me.

It's not you I miss, so much--
There are elements of you I miss
And elements of me with you I miss--
But when I grow quiet, and think of
Life in the receding "then,"
My heart reaches into that image to grasp
The dreams of the boy,
Not the hands of the girl.

But despite this smoky memory
And my unhealthy affection for
A thousand murky somewhens,
I am quick to remind myself
That the future is really still ahead of me,
And that only the players have changed.

So I, like my Irish bloodfolk,
Must press on to carve out
A new life in a new land,
Holding dearly to the memory
Of the Old World, while embracing
The endless possibility of the New.