you stopped caring about yourself around the same time that
she stopped fighting, which is
to say circa 1977, when president
jimmy carter asked you to turn down your heat, wear
a sweater, and you still trusted that things could change
so you wore two and shut your heat
off. she was no longer the beauty you married circa 1960, which is
to say she let herself go, which is to
say that you'd never loved her more.

now you're dead and she doesn't even
know it, but here i am getting ahead of myself again
and here you are hiding in the ground. i'm asking you to wake
up and you tell me no for the first time. your eyes stay shut.
now you're dead.

you finally gave up on keeping her home circa
2011, and you institutionalized her, and nothing had ever
hurt more. you stayed home alone. you
went to church. you visited her every day, and you prayed,
and nothing ever changed.

you went to the doctor. you died. you got cancer.
those aren't in the right order but you know
the story by
now. you can sort it
out.

you left me and i never even wrote that thank-you card that i thought about
for years, but i promise, i thought about it. i thought about
you.

here she is alone, here she is
trapped in her mind, here she is forgetting
you while you love her, here you are
six feet under, you silly goose. come home, we miss
you. come home, there's kolbas and solina and anything you
want. come home and maybe she'll remember
and maybe she won't
and maybe she's been dead since circa 1990
and maybe it's your turn now.

what's worse than the cancer - "everywhere",
as they put it, was the look on your
face when you told us about your 52nd anniversary. you
gave her a card and she looked at it for a moment, then handed it back to
you. they say she doesn't communicate with anyone anymore.
i think it's killing both of you.

i never wrote you a thank-you
note. i wrote you a eulogy three weeks before
you died. i brought cake but you're dead,
i cried for a week but you're dead.
i'm still crying. you're still dead.

i wonder if she remembers you at all.