0 Nowhere Man

A hole is nothing but what forms around it.
When you left I curled around myself to protect
me, but even then I had nothing. I forgot how
to kiss: is it lips on lips, or skin on skin? What about
two angels having a picnic on the side of a
volcano? What about nights we spent on the run
yanking each other over each fence like it was the equator
days broken down like teeth and shared like the smile
you gave me whenever I woke up upside down to you
like time was space and everything had a place - but then
how do you account for loss?
What fills up the hole you left here? It’s not like
Titanic where water rushes in although every time
I think of you leaving I still feel cold it’s more like
spreading out cookie dough and taking a stencil and
cutting out what you need, and rolling what you don’t into lumps
like tumors or coal. Into the oven at one thousand watts
each degree a day we could have wasted together
baking on this giant green rock we call earth like lizards.

You’re ten thousand light bulbs away and no reaction in time or space
could bring me back to you, you took the doorframe with you when you left
so I couldn’t even tell the carpenter how much I missed you,
took everything I gave you and left every penny
every coin I tossed into your fountain on the floor
while you drained the marble of its tears.
You’re gone, you’re dead, your bones are just a shadow
a million highways away and my heart is just a broken window.

I am still in the front yard waiting for you to come pick me up.

--Lindsey M., 23