It is not yet
dawn.
I wake up
crying
and wander
outside
in the near
darkness.
I want this to
be your aubade,
a morning song
leaving
cool lips in
the sunrise.
But under a porch
light
where no moths
gather,
a deep seated
saudade falls
like a curtain
over the scene,
this longing in
your absence
a melancholy I
fear will not end.
I can’t escape
the possibility
it was meant to
end this way,
that I was
meant to stay alone,
that I did
something
to make you
disappear
this time never
to return.
Or that I
should have showed up
at your house
and
taken you in my
arms,
kissed each
rugged worn finger
that night you
were sick
from heat
exhaustion
or that night
you said you
were fine but your
thoughts
really weren’t.
I’m supposed to
write a happy
ending where I
walk out of here
resolved to
move on but when I
Trust God and
Wait
what am I
waiting for? Dunno, but how
is certain:
slowly. I’ve always
run head-on and
fully towards
what I loved
too far and too fast,
and I fear
that’s what happened
here. Your
hands never got enough
attention. I
just wanted to hold them.
Now they’re on
the list of what I’ve
lost. Over-loved
and lost, but how
do you measure
love? I love you
more abundantly
than the tomatoes
in my garden
this year; I love you
more
serendipitously than the
volunteer trees
I’ve gathered
in pots and
around the yard for you
that you may
never come retrieve;
my love for you
is taller than the
sunflowers
bending over my shed
in the
backyard, their brown and yellow
faces watching
me now with a
certain sorrow.
They must be
thinking, poor
human.
I only wanted
to be your friend.
When will there
be a time I
cease thinking
of you? Perhaps when
I look out at
the porch light,
see the moths again,
and think,
so this is the
famous happiness
I’ve heard so
much about.
by Tansy Julie the
Soaring Eagle Paschold
8.13.24
after Bob
Hicok’s “True Story”