To you –
My dearest enemy

Even after all these years
I still remember

How could I forget?

When your rejection of my parole
Sentenced me with indifference
To remain imprisoned by the past

Yes
I know this letter
Is as pointless
As these memories that burn

You don’t care what I think or how I feel
You didn’t then, so why would you now?

No, it’s too late, I know

The days of working for a living wage
The nights of sleeping with a loving wife
The hopes of escaping from this locked room

All of them are gone

All that’s left
Are these yesterdays

The only way out –
To give in to their flames

That consume this empty shell
And intern the ashes of its anger
Inside the casket of these words

This final testament
To my will’s conscious impotence
That I address and leave to you –

My dearest enemy
The one friend that I have left

– J.H. Martin