Start/The Stopping

1.
my flames rise to the gulf of you.
i am the orange parachute in your black and white dream.
as my brilliance flares, your leaden tent
begins to form as skin.
my light is too slow in reaching your constellation.

2.
depression takes over
in the two minutes since you have left.
you move over me like frost.
if one hundred seconds
have wrenched blood from my heart so fully,
how will hours pass?
this minute prays for childless seconds, the time filled like ashtrays.

3.
the evidence has mounted:
a hand held loosely, by you and my wrist.
you surround me fruit-like, the rind torn away.
the pulp without shelter flows unconsenting.
the moon hits and hits
again. i trim the hangnail moon and close the blinds.

4.
there is no action kind enough to express heartbreak.
I am left
shut,
the quietest of blossoms.

Stella Padnos

Poems of Loss

Poems of Grief, Sympathy, Tribute, Goodbye and Healing

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