You don\'t lose someone all at once.
It’s a slow vanishing act,
Day by day, the absence takes a seat,
Sips your coffee, reads your paper.
Her scent lingers like a question
On pillows, in closets, a whisper in drawers.
With time, even ghosts pack up,
Move on from the fabric and the paper.
A mailbox grows hungry, its mouth agape,
No more letters with her name,
No more words to say: I am here,
To say: remember.
This kind of going away is a puzzle:
How she fills the room without a body,
How the years will take her bit by bit,
But never entirely, never all at once.