On Grief & The Future

I miss the life I thought I would have

I look back 

and I know I should never look back 

and I see hope in my smile I do not recognize

I see a dream I no longer know by name

I grieve it

I am mourning the loss of a future

That slipped through my fingers so deftly

So denied by those things I could never control

I do not respond to this trauma, it would take too much of my time

Instead 

I am whole-heartedly heavy

Full of yearning for another future

For an alternate universe where I did not lose the years

or the friends or the dog or the miles or the jobs or the time or the touch or the love

Oh – the love

I thought 

I have always known

I no longer have the answer

Instead

I am taking every opportunity to make real what I believed only mystic lore

Instead 

I tell myself again and a hundred times again that the love I have now is enough

It has to be

I tell myself again and a hundred times again that the love I have now is enough

It is enough for now and for now it has to be

On days where I find grief in every corner of this body 

I count upon those who have gifted me haven

Created space where there was none and invited me into it

No questions– their answer

a handheld pearlescent mirror

an open mouth

a palinode for the future

whispered and desperate 

again

a hundred times again