This poem is about the painful end of a close friendship and the illusions it creates: not only within the memories, but also in the context of psychosocial distance. The sense of closeness and, later, distance between the two ‘characters’ is little more than a construct: undeniable, but not quantifiable, real only in a relative way. Through the use of metaphors, I remove myself from the (largely autobiographical) narrative, but the memories are still raw, always hovering below the surface. The Illusion of the friendship is created (and recognized) in retrospect — modulated by both physical and temporal distance. Icarus, in my re-imagining, is a seeker, always running from himself and chasing new horizons. He is drawn to the lighthouse, who represents his opposite: an observer, stability personified, a guiding light in the storms. They are set on a collision course; the space collapses, even overlaps, and then suddenly, is unbridgeable.