As the day of your departure draws near,
I find my patience growing.

I sit in traffic, lending no thought
to the gas gauge or the electronic clock.
I enter interminable Christmas lines
caring little for the aching soles of my feet.
I slide between the polyester sheets of my bed
each evening, knowing the sun will rise in a
few hours, a beauteous and grim reminder
that time passes subjectively and without my
approval. I perform menial tasks—spreading
peanut butter thick on toast, holding
one-sided conversations with dogs, smoking
too many Marlboros at once, brushing my
teeth with unimaginable fervor, gulping
glass after glass of your orange juice—as
exercises in futility, ignoring the little
cloud that hovers over my shoulder.

In a few days, you will fly south with
the migrating birds and I will be left
alone in this house—the oldest daughter,
and the last to leave. I want to beg you not
to go, to cry on your tall, broad shoulders,
or at least spend every moment basking
in your beautiful presence, which I have
habitually taken for granted. Instead,
I smile, reiterate my ceaseless love,
and tell you how proud you make me—
that your courage and strength defines you.