Poetry Thurday: Endings and a Beginning

This is the poem I referred to in my last post. I wanted to write about things ending, about how that is the nature of things, and yet I didn't want this to be a sad poem. I wanted to write a poem about how life goes on. If gaps aren't always filled, then the pain left by their absence is eased by the emergence of new life.

Endings and a Beginning
Gone,
like the cat that
jumped out a window
one day and never returned,
like the box of family
photo albums misplaced
by the removal company.

The loss of you
left more space than
your body ever claimed
on the living room sofa.

We do not know
how to read the words
you will never write, nor
can we spread our arms
across the hole you left,
the chasm between us.

But the roses still
smelled sweet in the
Botanical Gardens today,
the kettle still boiled and the
phone still rang.

And at the letterbox
a strange tabby wound itself
around my ankles and
followed me inside.


Next week is the last Poetry Thursday. You helped me find my voice as a writer. I will miss you when you are gone.