What If I Have To Live Again

What if I have to live again— Reborn in the bone-thin hush of grief, A jawbone grinding air, My love trailing like a torn dress through corridors Of someone else's dreams. You cheated with a mirror. I saw you smiling at your double, Kissing her with the lips you pressed To my forehead after midnight sobs. How dare you touch her with my name in your mouth? I held trauma like a child— Rocked it, fed it milkless mornings. It grew teeth. It learned your scent. Now it prowls the house, breaking teacups And whispering, “He never loved you.” Unreturned love is a feathered god— It flutters near the ceiling fan, Then drops, headless, to the floor. You never wrote back. Your silence Was a continent. I crossed it barefoot. Each night I waited—candlelit, A saint in curlers, lipstick bleeding. Time, the drunk uncle, sat beside me, Rattling his keys, leering, Telling me you'd never come home. The sea was shallow. It mocked me. I went in to drown but hit my knees. Even death denied me the depth. Before I leave this to you— My wrists, my notebooks, my impossible verbs— Know this: the trees are dead. The bushes are brown. The wind Has given up on speech. I was blind, yes, But now I choose to look away.