This is the moment
she re-
discovers her sadness:
moons that caved in,
touchstones marooned
in her mind.
She marks all as red
as the wounds she wore
out in the mirror—
taffeta-trapped,
gasping through
mouthfuls of harm.
Whisper of once-was
lingering yet
in her fingertips,
she dreams con brio,
bravura, codetta,
dolore.
_
We can’t go back,
but there is this:
We can look back.
It has more do
with longing than love,
is more about
a place I can’t access
than something missing.
It’s only the urge
to hold you
I can’t shake.
_
How old were we
in the flood?
She counts the correlations
now, rising water,
arriving birds.
Hinged on a pigeon
that floated like a duck
in the tub, insistent on doing
everything she did.
The future fans before her
like a spread wing,
each year a flight,
each anomaly the hopeful
promise of success.
The present still
a handful of feathers,
unfulfilled.
_
Now, I sense all that’s left:
the way you pulled through me
like a fine thread through cotton,
buried yourself in me
like the knot beneath the weave.
No one can see, but running a hand
over my surface
I can feel you there.
Holding tight.
_
Miss is not the verb:
that I carry something
of you in me
is the important part.
Moments I would
have never left
more sacred for
the not remembering.
All points of contact
crumble, leaving
a breadcrumb trail;
dark birds wait to feast
on our sweet sorrow.
_
