It’s strange, in our lives…how the ending of something, can take us back to the beginning. The feelings that were there, the start of soemthing that became…something.
This poem…bitter and sweet for me. And I love it now. Like I loved it then. Even though now… I live it.
Study of Absences
by Letitia Trent
1.
The burglars slit open Christmas gifts,
impatient as children. Appliances were ripped
from the walls so hastily cords trailed
from sockets with their wiry guts
frayed out, plastic skins burst.
I inspect the squares of grime where things once stood,
the bugs and dust are collected like shadows
cut loose from their substance.
2.
I hear my feet slapping solo
on the cold linoleum. Coffee settles in the press. I can’t drink
it without you, the effort echoes old paths of movement; coffee
to table to kitchen, hands from cutlery to your forehead,
to your slick hairline, to your sticky eyelids. My body
must learn new directions, break the old
deference your absence renders unnecessary.
I set a glass of milk down, and though alone,
cross my ankles at the knee.
I admit, you bent my bones into new angles,
and I cannot stand to break
the bad knits
and take the itch
of the body stitching
them straight again.
3.
As you walk away I watch you receding,
watch the dark nestle deep in your ribs and the dips
in your shoulders, watch it clamber over your back
and swathe your flesh like a sweater. Now
you are lost in the dark of distance.
All little movements echo the big ones.
Time is the shadow clawing up your ribcage,
it is static that blooms between us.
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