This is part of the NBN series called “Inspired By Sound,” where writers use a song as the muse for their story. This piece by Carly Menker takes influence from "Forever and Always" by Taylor Swift.

Once Forever and Always 
You were something so constant

Something I never thought

Wouldn’t be there

In my life

In the words

In the pictures

In the lines of my story

I feel you forget me

The way I used to feel you breathe

The way you held me

Close to your chest

Safe

Secure

So

Sure

You’ve erased me

But with every piece of me

Each pixel, charcoal dot, ink speck

You erase a piece of you too

You can’t unsmooth a crumpled paper

You can’t get back what you’ve washed away

You can’t wish

That you can write yourself back in one day

The dust has settled

The magic has faded away

You once swept me off my feet

But now I hit the ground running

Long gone is us

A shadow of what we used to be

You there

Me here

Equally focused

Separately surviving

Us

To silence

Love

To nothing

You shattered me 

You hurt me

Smashed me

Into a million transparent shards

Glittering on the hardwood floor

Yet 

You taught me how to rebuild

When fractured glass is in a circle surrounding you

You need to pick up the pieces

Mend them back together

To something more beautiful than what they once were

And that’s exactly what I did.