Today is the last day

Today is the last day

Another last day of another startled goodbye

Your hands reaching up for the clothes

On the line

I'm holding you up to reach it

Reach everything you deserve to have

But I've only had days, never

Enough for much at all, except

To link ourselves together, long enough

To love, and to break, and to never be the same

Thank you. Your rare, chosen smile, your always

Expressive eyes, little voice.

I quake to think of how I had to leave,

Never to be seen again, oh how I long

To keep you with me, teach you, love you.

I will never forget it. I burn

With the brand fashioned like your face.

And I will wear the scar with pride,

After the tears have dried and

You've (I've) cried more than you knew you could

I always knew today would be that day,

Found it somewhere in your penetrating

Stare. It's no easier to hear you laugh or cry,

And the stoicism eats away at you.

But you are something more than a child,

That soul is older than most,

And it's so there, an ultra-present reality

Screaming at you in its assured subtlety.

I am slowly falling, limb from limb

And you have no idea, no idea

How hard it is to walk away.