melancholy

Half-breaths

Grieving is being
      at the bottom
      of quicksand
      trying to claw
      my way up —
because I need to breathe

When you died, my
      breath left with you
      my lungs, my life —
filled with half-breaths

I’m thankful for your life
is all that gets me through

Terri Guillemets

Now, in a Later Spring

Once, long ago, I heard an old man say,
      “Two pounds of sorrow is the price you pay
      For every pound of bliss.”
But I was young and such a reckoning
      Seemed far too steep; now, in a later spring,
      I’d gladly offer far, far more than this.

—Alice Mackenzie Swaim, “Now, in a Later Spring,” Crickets Are Crying Autumn, 1960

Vanished

i hurt every day remembering
that i wasn’t there for you
the hardest day of suffering
— i left you painfully alone
when you needed me most
so damn close, but not there
which is the farthest away —
i was a fool, oblivious numbskull
a frozen hearted ragdoll zombie

            i am sorry.


2024

I know a guy.
Angry. Festering
in disappointment
of the world
and of himself.
A little depressed.
Sick of doing
the same. freaking.
thing. every day.
Wondering where
his lost youth went.
Hungering to replace
the comfort and
all the good things
in his life that
have gone away.
But resolutely
continuing on
doing his duty.
Living with the pain.
Loving while he can.
Taking any little
laugh he can find.
Then doing it all
over again. Perhaps
you know him too.
Perhaps we all do
— inside.

Terri Guillemets