Seeing how much of it I can handle

Before the stomach muscles tighten,

And the breath slips

I talk to myself

While in the kitchen

Trying to cancel the silence

Trying to fill the space

Trying to ignore the spot on the floor where you would have been laying

Watching me or sleeping

Keeping me

Company

I try to keep moving

To stir up the air that has gone stagnant

In your absence

I tiptoe around the tiny land mines riddled throughout this house

They wait quietly; ready to set off some reminder

Should I step into my old routine

Should I forget

For just a second

On a Friday, after a long day of work

I go for a run out into the middle of nowhere

Where no one is watching

And collapse against the gravel road,

Sobbing

Declaring your absence

Putting it into words,

Taking it out of me

But I leave

Still full of the emptiness

You have left

Behind

It is the one thing

I can’t remove

Or get used to

I know summer by the knots in my hair
The pounding of my chest
The smell of dust on my hands
You pointed out spring to me
In the sound of the earth growing
Coming up from underneath
Fall’s dried leaves

In so many ways I feel that movement
Happening inside of me
Pushing past history
And using it as nourishment
To feed a better
Future