Did I breathe you in?
The salt spray of your bones,
The gust that blew you over the frosted caps.
You fell from my hands:
Grey, eggshell and sediment,
And I felt the absence of you in that fierce opening between my collarbones.
I fell into the bitter blue
And tried to feel you washing over me,
In my eyes, ears, between my toes.
But my hands came up empty,
The rippling rivulets a poor substitute
For a warm shoulder and a quiet laugh.
The prints from your feet have long faded,
But once again the substance of you disperses these waters –
A lonely mist at the bottom of the sea.
