Still Here

Facebook tells me it’s her birthday,
like she might still be somewhere
checking notifications,
blowing out candles,
answering messages
with that elf-like grin.
I quit looking at our past chats,
too many sensitive photographs,
intimate moments
that make her more present
than she is.
She’s gone,
that butterfly turned to dust.
Died last year
drinking in a fire.
That’s an ugly sentence.
No way to make it pretty.
No way to put a dress on it.

I sit there
for a frozen minute,
coffee going cold,
staring at her name
and that little picture
like it might change
if I give it time.
I remember the good parts.
She could laugh
like nothing ever hurt her.
She could make a room
feel brighter
just by walking in.
I always saw the spade behind her eyes,
that little shadow,
and the other parts too.
The drinking.
The way it took hold.
The way it changed her
into someone
even she didn’t recognize.
I’ve seen that look before.
Hell, I’ve worn it
for decades.
That’s the part that sticks.
Not that she’s gone,
but how close
the story feels.
Same nights.
Same bottles.
Same slow ride.
You don’t notice
until you’re already landing
on concrete.
It doesn’t take much
to imagine a different ending.
My name in that post.
Someone close,
staring at a reminder,
thinking,
damn,
he almost fucking made it.

But I’m still here,
still seeing another sunrise,
drinking my coffee
on the right side of the fire.
And I don’t know why.
Well, I do,
and it’s nothing I did.
Sometimes a birthday reminder
feels less like memory
and more like a warning.