Ghost Stories

Maybe
eventually
I will stop collecting bits of all
your most beloved things,
Rain in mason jars from
Storms we did not get drenched in together
Bits of string and textile from
hanging bird forms
And small drawings
I keep making for you
Books I keep binding for you
Songs I keep singing
in the kitchen
for you
The piece of Palo Santo I
brought home from the desert
and did not give to you
Movies we did not watch together
Jokes I told
that you would have loved
It is easy for me to love you when you are not here
because it is exactly like loving you
when you are standing in front of me:
Wracking
and terrifying
like a tornado in my ribcage
Like driving the Appalachian switchbacks at night
Ghosts are not real, they say.
Ghosts are ghosts; you are proof of it,
wandering my apartment in the dark
Picking up all my most precious things
and putting them back exactly where you found them.
Putting me back
exactly where you found me
Maybe
eventually
I will ask you to leave.
Maybe when the jars collect
and I am boxed in
soaking wet
dripping onto this secondhand rug
Maybe then, when there is no more room for me in here,
it will be time
But not yet.