Like your mother in the church, with her black stockings and her brown heels and her white dress. You knew, even then, how to be embarrassed.
I walked down the road with you, for miles we went, and it was so cold
and you told me what you told me. How when you were little...
When you were only...
When things were better than they are now.

There is too much to show you now. I hold many boxes at once. Like Annie Profit, though, nothing in there is mine. I fell off and forgot.

I said,"come inside." Careless. Breathing.

Big pieces have broken off. Ice that had hit you in the face.

People talk to me. With smiles.


It is still nothing like you walking towards me.