Like the fog

That moment when you know it’s over.
It doesn’t always hit you like a brick wall.
Sometimes the awful knowledge seeps into your awareness like a dense fog.
You’re helpless to prevent it,
Porous thing that you are.
You just absorb.

And hope
That you’re just imagining things,
That you’re wrong,
That the phone will ring or the text will come through or the email notification will chime the way it does
When it does
When He does
What you’re hoping he’ll do.

But it doesn’t.

And no one really said goodbye.
That it was finished.

It just
got
quiet.

Like the fog.
That tiptoes over the earth
The way his hushed voice brushed over your heart,
And warm breath brushed over your face,
Sweet like scent of rain,
Soft, like moss on the forest floor,
Dense as cloud cover,
Ethereal, like the emotion he inspired,
And there,
Right there surrounding you.

Then,
Gone.

– ajp
11/2015