Green Mint Leaves

I planted mint on your grave and it grew
into your shadow. I picked it and dried it, crushed
it into a tea, drank the part of you the sun
could never see into me.
*
How your voice quit sound and became
the scent of bagels in the toaster. How little
I can say in response.
*
I take your pause every third stair so they don’t
miss your weight the way a chair does
or a bed does or your pen.
*
And the day heat leaves
at night. And I imagine it your heat
leaving. I don’t notice when it
creeps back with the dawn, only this.


Photo by Robyn Jay, used and adapted under CC.