Purple Leaves

Do you remember the nights we spent
in your driveway
just sitting in my car
holding my hand?
We had no where to go
And no where to be
but we had that moment.

Do you remember that afternoon,
your little sister running around us;
So young, so excited,
And we spraypainted the leaves on the hedge.
At first blue, but then green, to try to hide it,
So you wouldn't get in trouble.
But still some blue showed.

Do you remember when she went inside
and you told me when we get out of here
You wanted a tree with people leaves.
I laughed and asked "why purple?"
And you scrunched up your face and said "because."
And that was good enough for me.

I drilled a hole in a piece of wood;
then I drilled another.
I put a rope through both holes and knotted it.
I got out a ladder and climbed up it,
tying the rope around a low thick branch of
The tree with purple leaves.

Emma ran outside, her young heart
hammering away, gulping in sweet summer air.
She ran through the freshly cut grass
That you mowed because you know
How much I hate it.
She ran to my swing and sat on it.

She pumped her little legs,
her long dirty blonde hair flying back behind her.
Her sweet laugh so full, so dulcet, so innocent.
There's no doubt who her mommy is,
but she had my eyes.
Her cyan dress crumpling beneath her,
but not revealing.

I sat with my back passed against
the trunk of a scarred tree. My eyes red
and glassy. Clenched in my left hand
is a wilted rose, red chasing brown, the
Thorns digging deep into
my flesh.
A cold wind blows and I sit
Atop my headstone alone,
Surrounded by purple leaves,
Left alone, cold, on the ground.