she writes me a requiem
for our encounters, waving
like a flag outside in the yard.

i find her photographs and boots in
odd, less-frequented corners:

we'll never
decipher the scrawled handwriting.

when the wind hits in
gusts, it bleeds through my
jacket. we splatter to the soil,
churning towards an
unforgiving
sea.

you always worked
blue

into your patterns—
always molded the

colour and feeling
with darker shades, like

paint splattered
in a room with no
windows.

half-brightened in starlight's silver stream,
pulsing like the gentle whisper of your dream;
pulled from the cradle of spring's bright
and tucked into winter's evernight.

your reply opens,
pale,

mine to darken.

but screenlight's not quite like starlight;

it's not enough to hold onto.
not enough to never let go.

I have digested the thought
of what it would mean
To lose you,
Or even just one memory of you.

I have chewed the bone
And ****** the marrow
on the mention of your absence.

And I have thought of how pitiful I would be.

Study the anatomy of me.
Find a tree.
branches reaching high and strong
To show the world how green the earth can be.
Trunk, sturdy and steady, to stand and keep standing.
Find feeling in the roots.

In the memory of us
In those I've held
And those who have held me.

Digest it.
Breathe it in.
Nurture the nuance
and open your eyes.

Do not pity the pained who have loved,
Pity the loveless that live unscathed.

Study the anatomy of me,
Find my heart,
A garden in my chest, each flower from those hearts I've held.

grandeur—
starlight trickling
into sea; she nodded
beside me, gracefully.
she fell into never,
beside me.