Instead I pack
my little bag and drive
around thinking I should
cry, at least feel
something. Then life carries
on the way a river does
after a drowning. I go
about my business for weeks
or months before tears start
falling out like teeth. What sets them
off could be anything – a splash
of hawk across a blank
canvas of sky, or the mention
of a sad animal somewhere
who can’t understand its own
suffering. What I mean is my grief
is not my own. It waits
in the wings to slink
onto stage and perform. Its body
twitches at first then relaxes, rises
on tiptoe, arms stretched
wide as if to say this
is how big, and collapses
in a choreographed heap, spine
silken as it billows slow back
up to standing. The rise, the fall: the cycle
of things. Finally, bright
lights – grief bows low, plants
a kiss at its own feet, waves
us on.
Photo by used and opethepainter, adapted under CC.
