your soul's quiet exit

142 days

since my name

rolled back along your tongue

only to be swallowed by the void

that endless ravenous hole

unraveling your mind bit by bit

a brazen thief plucking thoughts

and memories

time and experiences

until you've nothing left

and I'm grieving

your demise while

you stare vacantly on

I try to steal them back

stuff my ears, my mouth, my hands

with fistfuls of promises and

moments between us

push them gently into

your sagging mouth

and hope...

but they crumble to dust

lost to you

as you're lost to me

It's cruel you still look like you

but also not

an empty doppelgänger

left in the wake

of your soul's quiet exit

and I'm left loving your ghost

while you wonder who I am

and I wonder that too in

every moment of the now

what I'll be like at the end

when we're both released

from this daily torment

for now I kiss your brow

as you sleep

thoughts of what's to come

laid to rest for

a few short hours

today is all I can manage