For K.A.

Grief has blurred us, made us
both older and younger than we are.
Backs hunched into each other, arms reaching always--

Waking, you tell me your dreams,
and I try to pick out whether I had any or whether life
just proceeded without sleep after I closed my eyes

We are moving your stepfather's things,
and you are talking too much, and too fondly of your exes
(my gut curdles)

I think: if your mom were here-- what a perfect day
sunned shins and sorting through old letters
watching the setting sun over Homer's sea

Finally, sobered, I understand what wine dark means,
but not why people return, or why they don't
After all those years--

She is not. You cry into my sternum,
(me wishing I had more to offer, in the way of
spare parts) and your nightmares fight the pills.

This my first night without you in four days,
no one kicking things off my table with impossibly
long Michelangelo legs and I think

your body might be the Renaissance. I think
these days my parents hug me with force,
I think I once had a life outside of you--

It was yesterday you, me, the caretakers Night and Day
discussing the size of your mother's breasts.
Huge tits, sings Day, just huge--

I never noticed, Night says, hiding where?
You never saw her standing up, Day says in worship, motioning
her two cupped hands like tipped mountains.