The wound is forming a scab.
New-knit memories are healing it back.
The wound will scar,
so it could be skin again.
To feel, to be caressed—
by the sun,
by your touch,
by the rain..

The wound will be skin again.
To be scratched and ripped away.
The wound will bleed—
but it will be skin again.
Healed by a newly-formed scab,
woven from fresh threads of recollections
and bedtime-story yarns.

I heard an expert say
missing someone
is simply an act of love—
So often woven
into unhealed pain
and heart-sores.

I thought of the night
I vowed to engrave
your laughter in my soul.
Kept safe as a personal vinyl,
sometimes replayed—
because I kept my word.

Sometimes with watery eyes,
Sometimes with contained sighs,
Sometimes with deceitful what-ifs,

Sometimes in late shifts,
Sometimes in mood swings,
Sometimes in life’s sweet plot-twists,

but always—always—
thinking of you.

At the edge of your sheets
I take off my sweater;
my sorrows and earrings
get stuck in it.

They're both still there,
under your bed.
It's no problem if,
with kisses, you drain me.

But stay close
to the erratic rhythm
of my heartbeat

A  battle of egos under the table.
Will they notice my blush
from this angle?
Any maiden in line
for your last name?
Would you ******* a vest
If I aimed at your chest?

I’d love a cheat day
In my calendar—
Let my years-patched dignity,
For a single day,
be torn again.

I wish I could tell you
I wrote a poem for you—
A cheesy gift
for your thirtieth—
I know.

You are still breathing.
Yet I pin to my chest
A neat, felt
black ribbon—
To commemorate
The aching