i wish you were here
i wish you could join me in my secret misery,
the one you always say but never addressed
you always made me smile
with the turn of phrase or secret ingredient,
a bon mot and some gossip
i’m sorry i couldn’t help more
i swear i did the best i could
i’m no antidote to amiodarone, nothing was
i still hear your pain, in the dark,
back buckling under the inevitability of it all
i was proud of all you withstood,
a lesser man couldn’t have made it half as long
with a quarter as much decorum, even to the end
your way with words had punctuation, coherence,
all i can muster is fragments of what was once there
i don’t know what you saw in me
i’m afraid you saw yourself
and i’m sorry i’ve not yet lived up to my potential
in those moments where i’m close,
i think of you not wanting me to suffer alone
or suffer at all, and its been enough to get me through
so far

i think of the promise i made
that we’d piss on his grave;
you said he would only leave there in a wooden box
and i think you’ll be proven right
i’m just sad you didn’t live to see it;
spite can only take you so far
but then i remember you’re free
exactly where you wanted to be
amongst the good you did for others
and never yourself,
circling eddies ever-changing
the ashes of your fire