love letter – Hannah Maiden

November 21, 2019

Dearest one, you were

I asked you where the love goes when it is over
I am saddened, my love

The day I knew my dad would die
I called
in the cab to Brooklyn, sunny headache
afternoon
you were on the other side

I sat at the gate and faced a wall, heaving
My sister joined me and we ached
heavy

Blood buzzing

I have poured much of my pain and pleasure down your throat
And shared what little I had
How did I taste
Does it not always arrive at this idle reduction, that there was
Simply not enough

And I asked you “where the love goes when it is over?”

Does it dry up
Like a riverbed
does it spoil
sour milk lover

When I think about his death, and the grief that follows
I wonder
If sorrow eases, am I
forgetting

his goodnight words, or sneakers on the stairs

This summer was goodbye
To a time and a place of this beautiful gloom that encompasses
My heart
touching all of the people I have loved and
now lost

I was looking under every surface for
yours
I tried to find semblance
I swear

I am
reeling
I am
not real
and neither is this night

It is difficult to separate the losses
What they hold and what I am
left with
It leaves me
wondering

I do not know what I have to offer
anybody
right now

I watched it all run out