Bitter Tea

One heart, two lungs,

One liver, two hands,

Two eyes and a nose.

Crooked teeth and a smile

That can shatter your world

Into a million pieces,

While simultaneously fixing you into a whole.

I eat with him every evening,

I tell him he is chewing too loud,

Ask him if he’d like a cup of tea.

I laugh at his jokes, shout at his stupidity,

Hide from his disappointment,

Cry when he doesn’t return

After a truck hits the side of his car;

Wrapping it around the front

Like a towel around his waist.

I scream when the doctors stop performing CPR

And the nurses hang their heads.

I beg when they return to their everyday business,

He was just another spilled carton of milk

And they had cleaned up best they could

But couldn’t save the carton.

Now I eat alone on my sofa,

My partner in crime six feet below.

I write my days in a diary

A letter to the grave.

I eat in silence

The absence of chewing mocking my ears,

As our symphony of mastication

Is broken into a solo.

And the kettle sits on the side

Unused for days,

Weeks,

Months.

Because the taste of tea is bitter now.