leaving home
a picture taken every day,
deposits
for my heart
through my eyes
one day you’d leave
and i’d have you
right there,
in my pocket,
in my hands,
always
i thought
on the day you spread your
wings I scrolled through albums,
dismayed, finding not one
single photograph
of you
pages
pages
pages of likenesses,
of smiling empty shells,
of emotionless tears,
of disconnected moments, of
joy, yet still…
something missing
hours
hours
hours of snippets
of film, twirling ribbons around your head,
of trampolines, of the park,
on buses, in plays, at dinner
mine, ours, yet foreign
incomplete
in dreams i feel your animation
in photographs i see your form,
and with this separation of essence and
image, the distance between us grows
had i contorted, squeezed myself
into one of the many suitcases, you’d
have left that one behind
when you went
rightly so, freedom-seeker
i didn’t have you
so i could keep you
leftovers
you left a spoon on the counter, sitting
atop a plate, accompanied by a
now-molded teabag drenched in milk,
a reminder of how you always forgot to
remove the bag before adding it
you left your hair on the shower wall, flicked
haphazardly in clumps then swirled artfully as you
thought about getting out to throw it away,
stopping, because you’d remember, you thought,
yet never did
you left your book on my chair, precariously
dangled over the armrest to mark your page as
you fell asleep on my arm after telling me you
weren’t tired, you just wanted to rest your eyes,
and i carried you to bed
you left coconut oil and nutritional yeast,
shatavari, triphala, ashwagandha, cumin, strewn
across the table, purposes unclear, names
unpronounceable, tokens of tastes i could not
replicate without your instruction
you left notebooks on our shelves, some filled,
some unfinished, all containing the parts of you i
never knew, secret thoughts for your mind only,
and though even now i would not read, for a
moment i feel you when i brush my fingertip
across their spines
you left your car at the side of the road in the night
a year ago, hazard lights flashing, doors open and
keys in the ignition, purse on the passenger seat
and phone on the ground, ringing,
silenced, ringing, silenced, dead
i left everything where you left it, my feelings
frozen too, so if one day you chose to come home
you would walk through the door as if stepped
back in time, find all as it was, for no amount of
space, nor reason, years, nor pain, could render
you replaceable
moving on
the phone i bought two months before he died,
replaced, expensively, to
lighten the weight of oft-repeated
voicemails and re-read texts
in my pocket
kept it in a drawer to open
only after popping the cork
from bottle number two,
or was it three
or four?
“it’s me, call me back,
it’s me, call me back,
it’s me, call me back…”
if i could...
for months, on repeat
one evening i dropped the
phone in my glass, bubbles
of poison encasing what
remained of his voice and i
rescued it
sealed it in a box of rice,
revived
vowed to never endanger it again
“it’s me, call me back,
it’s me, call me back,
it’s me, call me back…”
more months, more repeats
one morning i met someone in
the park who had his eyes and
we took a walk until noon
i missed you while you were gone
floated words in my head
for months, no repeats
no corks
just walks
and more
one day my walkmate dropped
his phone in the river, sank
to the bottom, and i couldn’t
rescue it
i have a spare one at home
i said he could have
i’m not using it any more