I dream of you.
And not the good dreams of our past.
But of how different your illness could have been.
How I could have tried to save you.
Each night a new way you could have gone.
Or how I could have failed you.
Like a film on repeat with different endings.
How I could of failed to save you,
In multiple different ways.
How you could have suffered.
And when I awake
I'm left feeling broken all over.
As if I've lost you again in different way,
But the ending remains the same,
You are gone.
I failed to save you.
I lost you.
The ending doesn't change,
The loss remains so fresh,
I awake wondering if you've just left,
Or if you've been gone a long time.
The end remains the same,
I miss you.

I still look to you.
I still hope for answers,
I know won't come.
I reach out for assurance
I know you can no longer give.
Some days I still expect you to be there.
Others I know you'll never be there again.
Most days I can't think to far ahead,
For fear of drawing in the realization you're gone.
And there are so many milestones ahead
You wont be there for.
So most days I think only minutes at a time.
To prevent myself from drowning,
In the reality of an entire lifetime without you.
So sometimes I still look to you for answers
Other times I know i'll never get them.

And some days are better then others.
Most days its a dull ache,
In the pit of my chest.
But someday, it's a typhoon.
Of sadness that washes over me.
And I gasp for air in the suddenness of it.
Coming out the other side drenched
In despair, choking of saltwater.
Most days you being gone has become
The norm.
And other days,
The realization of the "norm"
Slaps me so hard across the face
I'm left reeling from the pain.
Spinning from the sharp jarring,
Of the realization that my days
For nearly 2 years have started
Without you.
But always this emptiness persists.
Some days I can by without drowning.
Other days,
It feels like I'm drowning forever.

Feeling like you're dying.
But breathing.
Wanting to die.
But wanting to live.
Drowning without water.
Suffocating surrounded by air.
Lost in a crowd.
Utterly alone in a room full of people.
Knowing Life is to short,
But it's so long.
A contradiction of epic proportion.
Depression is
Dying but never ******* dying.

Before I even walked through the door
My glasses have fogged up from
My own breath bouncing out of my mask .
We walk through the door, check out Temps.
We've passed the screening
We wash our hands.
We hit the floors.
We always wear masks now.
Answering call lights that never end
We wash our hands.
Put on our gowns, gloves, shield.
Put on a brave face to take care of you.
Countless times.
We take off our gowns, gloves, shield.
Hand sanitize.
Wash our shields with bleach.
Wash our hands.
The skin on our hands are peeling.
Cracked open and bleeding.
But the lights keep ringing.
Patients need us.
We answer more lights.
And wash our burning hands.

My life can be best described as
No one
Who's been sitting on a chair with
A broken leg for her whole life.
A tetter totter to balance myself
In hopes I don’t fall
Or the chair doesn’t break under me
In Utter embarrassment and shame

Christmas cheer this year
Is wrapped in tinsel and tears.
Another year has passed
Another year gone.
Each one as hard as the last.
I miss you now,
Just as much as then.
I put on a brave face,
I step into the crowd and,
I'm so out of place.
No family here,
No anchor to my past.
So every new year's as hard as the last.
I hope that you know
We love you so.
And every year we leave you a chair,
In Hope's that each year you'll be there.