This is dedicated to a girl I used to know.

Every so often, we call, for duty’s sake,
And we sit through painful conversation, and polite games.
We used to be close, you and I,
Now we are strangers who know each other’s names.

Is affection held in thrall by convenience?
Are all friendships made to die like ours?
Are relationships defined by time and space?
Can closeness be measured in minutes and hours?

We must shed the debris of our cluttered lives.
If we now laugh with others, that is no crime.
Notwithstanding the frail links of parts of a shared past,
We are only strangers who knew each other once upon a time.