I haunt this house I once called home

The floors creak

The cats watch me

But your grief exists around me—untouched

I have seen the joy leave your body

I have seen you wracked by sobs,

Curled in the bed we slept in together

I see your eyes wander,

Glaze over,

All of your consciousness lost to another place

Another time, perhaps?

I remember the day we first came here

Some velvet-lined, sepia-colored summer afternoon

I said that we would die in this house

I did not dream

Had not thought

That I would be the death of us

Meanwhile, in an apartment downtown,

My soul walks the well-worn path of an ordinary life

Brush my teeth

Feed the cat

Open the window and breathe in the soft autumnal morning light

My heart sits at table in front of a mojito,

Laughing at another man’s jokes

And the mint tastes like starting over

And the laughter feels like freedom

But my heart

My heart feels like homesickness and guilt

And my head is already on his chest

As we lay in the quiet dark

All of the fragmented pieces of myself

Disjointed

As though you were the glue that held us together