Suspended

to H,

A week since the storm,
and she wants to gather
all the broken pieces
of yesterday.

She wants to build from them
a boat strong enough
(at least now, if not before)
to keep herself afloat.

She wants her oar to find the bottom
of what seems like an endless, overturned sky.

She desperately wishes that the wave
wasn’t, to you, just a ripple.

She wishes that, to you,
she wasn’t just a fallen leaf—
yet another scar on your face . . .
your tranquil, numb surface.

A week since the storm,
and she wants all the broken pieces
of yesterday to actually mean
something to you.

She desperately wishes that the ripples
could serve as a map to your heart.

But she has learned that
a boat built on—built of—
brokenness,
is no real boat at all.

And so leaves crash,
ripples splash,
yet neither make a sound . . .

only a, now mutual, silence
that is absorbed by the hardness
of a single, unspoken “good-bye”.

(no where near the sting — the pang
of your putting in no objection to her leave . . .
just watching her,
as she floats
away.)