The water is deep and you are gone.
again. I should be used to it. I miss you most when it rains. The petrichor drowns your scent/laugh/touch/voice- the waves of missing you crush me with their weight. Sometimes, i drown. More often, i swim. rarely, i float.

"Sea to shining sea", I you, we are lonely. Never alone, they say we say, but always alone. cold nights and endless mornings. Sometimes, on calmer days i look back .
To when you were here. When we were we. I love you. To the depth of your ocean. with the weight of your ship. To wherever you are and back again. but.

You are not here. You are gone and the dark water rises to cover my mouth so you can't hear my scream. a small mercy.
The sun rises in the morning- it makes me cry.

Our stars- the same where you are as i am in our white house on our porch with my flag- are gone. It's harder to imagine you here. the sun is too bright to lend me your warmth.  And you are gone.

I eat lunch, see friends, miss you. Our house feels like my house. But a picture reminds me. It is shared by two. Sometimes.

sometimes  i can close my eyes
         and picture you here; sometimes i think of you and smile. Mostly, i wait for you. wonder about you. Rarely do i go a day without missing you, never do i go a second without thinking of you.
    
You come back to me like the waves. But you are not- The Same. I worry until you leave again. Then constantly, i worry still.

But this time when the rain falls, you drown. I don't. yet.
The waves proved too much and they knock "rap, rap,rap" on my tiny red door in the middle of the blackest night
they are sorry, they say.
so am I, I cry until i flood the earth, fills their oceans, drown my pain and their pathetic remorse, the flag they give me is soaked but it helps me stay afloat

This little white house is mine, not ours, and i can no longer swim.

We are too happy. we were- must have been.
You are not here.You are far away and i lie alone. I wake alone.

Your letters, all i have of you- fill me with love/longing/fear. I worry for you and things you have seen. Places i won't go.

everything you don't/ can't tell me screams wordlessly in my brain. It's too loud for me to sleep. To quiet to stay awake.

i tell you only lies. pretty ones. "I love you (I do), i miss you, you'll be home soon" i want to say-
I am not okay. I miss you so much it is like the knives we got for a wedding gift, the ones you've barely used, are sticking cold and steely in my heart and i am dying,  you won't be home soon you never are. But i wish you were- i love you- i write to you- i'll wait for you.

I kiss you. Goodbye. I wait under you- watch until the plane
goes up. above my by miles, away from me my countries.

The gravel road of our driveway is cool and firm
the sand of the desert is hot and shifting and you are gone

You promise to be home soon- we both know you won't but pretend to believe this is a promise you can keep

you will not be home soon, if you come home at all
I miss you i wait for you i want you here
but you don't come, you can't

Backwards hat displaying his favorite team.
Camouflage blowing in the breeze.
Desert wind whipping stars and stripes into a fury.
Tortured holidays spent away from home.
A ration of turkey will have to do.
X tattoo on his upper arm.
A shaky faith in God.
A devil who feels more real.
Babies born thousands of miles away.
Time through an hourglass like sand.
Plenty to go around.
A mission.
Another deployment.
Very few questions asked.
Because the country asked.

She washes a dish, checkered blue
Sudsy bubbles trapped between pruned fingers.
A monitor sits on the sill,
And sounds of laughter carry through
Their voices piercing, high and shrill

The desert stretches for miles, tired, red
As he sits alone on his cot
Stealing a moment of silence.
The sand creeps into tents
Through cracks the soldiers forgot.

She is tired, so tired—but not enough to forget
That the boys’ field trip is tomorrow
So she packs lunches, a matching set
Identical, except for pickles on the one
Which the youngest can’t seem to swallow

He opens his dirt stained letter once again,
And takes out the photo hidden within.
Hand resting on fatigued knee, he looks down and sighs
At two gap-toothed boys, a woman, and a dog
Cracked  fingers tracing lips, resting in their laughing eyes.

HOW DO YOYU POLITELY TELL SOMEONE THAT WHEN THEY LEFT YOU WRAPPED YOURSELF IN THEIR MEMORIES AND THEY WERE THE ONLY THING YOU COULD FALL ASLEEP TO.

HOW DO YOU TELL SOMEONE THAT EVERY SECOND OF YOUR TIME WAS SPENT WORRYING ABOUT WHETHER OR NOT THEY WERE OKAY LIKE I WAS YOUR MOTHER BUT I WORRIED ENOUGH FOR THE BOTH OF US.

THE ONLY COMFORT I HAD WAS IN THE NIGHT TIME BECAUSE I KNEW YOU WERE SLEEPING AND NOT SUFFERING. YOU CHOSE TO LEAVE MY LIFE ENTIRELY BUT I DID NOT STOP WORRYING I TRAINED MY MIND TO WORRY ABOUT YOU AND I WILL NEVER HAVE THE COMFORT OF KNOWING YOU’RE OKAY.

THE NIGHT YOU GOT DEPLOYED THERE WAS SOMETHING COMPRESSING MY CHEST FOR HOURS I COULDN’T BREATHE I COULD ONLY PANIC I COULD NOT SLEEP IN MY OWN BED BECAUSE ALL I COULD FEEL WAS YOUR ******* GHOST THAT I USED TO CLING TO BUT NOW I AM BEGGING IT TO LEAVE ME ALONE

I cannot move, breathe, think, speak,
Legs splayed across cool sheets
That you departed from,
Your legs splayed in dusty sun
Far away.
Dim light filters through the
Dark blue muslin curtains we bought
Years ago,
Or it could have been days - each second is an eternity with you,
The curtains that reminded us of the night we met.
I can't bear to see the flag in the corner, tear stained,
Like my black clothes still strewn across the carpet.
All gone.
Somewhere in the back of my
Aching head, piano music plays and I
Believe
It is the song you played, the only one you knew,
When you asked me to marry you. I said yes
You hit the cheap keyboard so hard with joy
It broke, and all the keys spilled onto the ground,
Little pieces of black and white laughter.
And my heart swelled to the point of
Bursting
When you signed up, with your brave face and handsome eyes,
To defend me.
We both left unsaid the painful truth:
You would go away and maybe you wouldn't come back.
The day of your deployment my throat was so thick
I was choking on my fears, little dark stones of misery
Settling in my stomach before you even left, tainting the
Brilliant blue sky.
My wedding ring felt so heavy I would have
Sworn it would pull me right down through the
Hot, tar-scented asphalt swarming with camouflage.
I could barely whisper how much I loved you,
Tears dropping from my eyes, so swollen I
Strained
To catch a final glimpse of you, looking over your shoulder,
Your brave smile, handsome eyes
You blew me a kiss
I lost it,
My emotions pouring from my heaving chest, ugly sobs,
Let my eyelids sink over the image of you
Walking away.
It is my biggest regret, not watching until the
Last second.
If I had watched you leave, maybe somehow
You would have come back.

As if you ever stopped to wonder about the hurt you put me through
as if i meant nothing the way you look me over
as if the world dint stop turning when i heard you were going
as if i am a child and you with your facts
and real "outlook " on life is the only thing you see
as if my belief that happiness could be ours is such a silly idea
Misplaced hope  You said.
why have you left me before you have even been shipped off
and i refuse to believe the **** you give me about not being able to
"commit yourself" to the navy and me at the same time
i was doing fine, you came back to me, this isn't fair
it is almost 2 a.m.  and your words are running through my head
The world is not a fantasy gen, we cant just run away and hope for the best
when people come back, they aren't supposed to go away again
out of the blue, disappearing,
to avoid a stupid wall they have put up from breaking down
just because the feel they care about someone too much
i almost had you .you almost gave in.
you told me you wanted me
and that you would love me till the day the sun goes out,
come back.