Yeah, maybe.
everything’s dying, and i skipped church again.
in the car, the light turned green but we just sat.
people started beeping but the weather
was arresting. that, and the shadows of our
individual thoughts dancing on the glass. it caused
a calm inertia. i could have sat there all day.
at the restaurant, in a trick of coincidence, you walked in with a new lady.
we said our awkward hellos and introduced our new significants
without acknowleging just how significant this event was,
as if we’d each gotten lost on different roads to neighboring cities and suddenly
were asking directions at the same gas station, nodding cool hellos.
thinking about it on the sidewalk later, the indian summer sun
bleeding over me, i felt the ache that comes from
letting hollow spaces stay empty: specifically, that our
story never had a moral so we let it end, quietly.
i remember the size of your back, and how it doesn’t matter now.
i’ve packed my affections in little brown boxes and
shipped them off to someone else,
and i’ll do it again, and i’ll do it again, maybe,
with — (yes, certainly) — regrets but also
with a warm jacket on and enough cookies to last me through this tired infant winter.