I have nothing left to feed the phone lines.
No tiny crumbs of conversation for us
to flick back and forth across the table.
The silence pulses, heavy, over dinner;
it lingers in your nostrils and lunges
down into your chest.
I am the white handkerchief you pinned
to the clothesline: whipping in the wind
in a wave hello, or help, or surrender.
(I am not used to how weightless this feels.)
It rained all over my fresh laundry this afternoon
and there are no more sounds left to swim.