Your loss must have exploded from your heart.
I heard that small, still voice of longing as the ash
settled from the sky --
melancholy floated over the hills on the wind.
I tried to catch the emotion in a mayonnaise jar
like those lightning bugs when we were little--
But, I never thought
and it turns out that the holes in the lid were too large.

I was sorry to see your grief set loose
from my childish jar
to lose a thing and then lose the sadness--
to be doubly bereft.
I expected the feeling to have floated
halfway across the country by now . . .
and, yet, there it still is
draped around your shoulders
as if to keep you company on lonely nights.