Poems

Keepsakes

When your mother died, I sent you a brace of dead twigs.

When your dog died, I sent you a dozen dried roses.

When your hamster died, I sent you a wreath of bones.

But when you died, my love, I sent you my heart,

Pinned to a checkerboard by a thousand cupid wings.

Dark earth and bright above

We’re flesh suspended between mud and stars.

Is the space between any less worthy?

You can’t have one without the other.

Worth is not decreed

By light or dark

But by the art of being.

Existence is the miracle we’ve all achieved.

How do we spend this gift:

Slinging mud or reaching for the stars?

As I spilled my angst onto the pages, drowning in existential dread,

You materialized, as if conjured from the air,

charging across the carpet with purpose.

A thousand legs pumping.

I watched you scramble toward my socks,

Leftover from last night’s undressing.

Should I let you go, or will I find you later,

Hiding in my clothes?

As the vacuum nozzle chases you down,

I wonder if you sense your own existential angst.

Does it feel like mine?

Like drowning without air?