A/N: Written for the Freeverse Frenzy Competition, poem 2, for the Pairing Set Bootcamp, pairing 2 – Harry/Ginny, for the If You Dare Challenge, prompt 960 – give up the ghost.
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2. Like a Mother
She reminded him of his mother
or how he saw his mother
in his dreams…
Because he had never known her
in the end, save from those dreams –
the nightmares where her soft voice
cried like a knife slicing cleanly
through the skin, for the meat…
and those other sorts of dreams
that were gone into wisps of smelling salt
when he awoke
But she was real, as large as life
with her red hair bouncing
on her back
and yet always gone when he ran,
tried to catch
And the stories that told of their sharp tongues –
a tongue he had never felt
But that was before he felt her lips upon his own
because he might not have known his mother
but he knew her.
She was no ghost
nor a memory
but something different altogether.