If you had tried to
save me.  Not like a
rusted ship resisting,
balking on the way
to salvage.  If all you’d
chosen to fix
was a collar
turned down and
said I’ve picked you
from all the others.
If you’d smoothed
out all the bad days
not like
frictionless ice ready
to slide away but
a stroll through
mown fields, into
the dwindling summer
day, saying everything
should wait.
If you had shown me
that nothing mattered
not in the way that
all is lost.  But because
lost in time with
you,
matter melted away.