before i go.

A new depth of sadness rose up in me the other day
as I walked down the street I thought it was choking me.
An unguarded moment that slipped past.
So sneaky
that my eyes clouded over.
I imagined a smaller version of myself curling up like a little ball on the sidewalk
knees to chest.
But I only paused briefly, clenched my fists, kept walking.

It is in this way that you enter, silently, into my days.
Disrupting my futile attempts at control.

Last week i dreamt I had been tied to a chair in a room
and gagged.
I looked out of the small window of the room and saw you walking by.
I tried to yell, but you didn't hear me -
      My mouth full of cloth.

Daily I try, in my way, to die to this.
To kill whatever it is that needs to be killed
Inside of me.

But there are the days I forget why.
So instead i'll struggle to remember what your voice sounded like
or the quiet way that it cleared a space in me.

The confusion chips away at your image
Your face fades though I try to reconstruct it
piece by piece
with my fingertips.

soft.

So now I'm like a leafless tree in late fall.
Shivering,
and waiting for the cold

to

descend.