Invalid Credentials

My fingers went to the keys without asking my brain,

tracing the pattern of a name plus a significant date.

It’s a ghost in the nerves, a repetitive strain

of a life I finished and left to its fate.

The cursor just blinks in the login square,

a black vertical pulse on a flat, white screen.

That old inbox is gone, vanished into the air,

with all the frantic demands and the things that I’d mean.

I wonder how many megabytes of my memory are lost

to strings of characters that no longer unlock a door.

It’s a high-rent storage for a very low cost,

keeping the combinations for a house that isn't there anymore.