Typewriter Series #2686 by Tyler Knott GregsonI’ve worn...

Typewriter Series #2686 by Tyler Knott Gregson

I’ve worn the floorboards smooth, calloused feet
from walking the same routes that used to
lead back to you.  I step into the all but faded light
and swear I catch the shape of you, phantom like
and aglow in the bit of shine a crescent leaves.  
No wind can come to soothe this away, no soft breeze,
no sound of aspen leaves quaking, no distant
thunder or strobe of lightning.  This will not numb.

What becomes of routines when they no longer
are required, what do we do with our hands,
our care, our worry?  Where does it go, this need,
does it learn the way of forgetting itself,
does it slow like a heartbeat heading for
obsolescence, does it sing out one final note,
sustained and quivering?  You were here,
and now you are gone, and I am lost
in all this missing.  

I’ll search out your silhouette in the final light
of each evening, I will come to the door
as if to let you in, as if you’re there, waiting.
I will be what you were, naturally and effortless
and without worry or cause to care,
I will be kind, and gentle to everything
and everyone.  I will allow myself the indignity
of losing myself in play, in folly, in reckless
wandering.  I will lean in when I am afraid,
allow those that know the way to soothing,
to soothe.  I will stand, stare out at where you
loved to rest, and see you there again, if for
a moment, if but out the corner of my eyes.
You were the best of me, and if you were ever
lonely, you never let me know.  Maybe in this,
I was the best of you, lonely for years, but still
so very full of hope, of patience, of some goofy,
good-natured flavor,
of joy.

-Tyler Knott Gregson-