Voids
I looked for you today.
Looked with each breath and each heartbeat.
I looked in those places where you used to sit,
Bright and eager, my sunrise and my sunset.
The steam from my coffee.
The pegging out of washing.
The smile from across a room.
The warmth beneath the quilt.
Instead, there sat a lump,
in the centre of my chest,
and I revolved around it,
around this cold, igneous mass,
that loomed with a heavy emptiness.
I orbited without contact,
Distanced.
Until its gravity was too great to resist.
Inwards I surged, into the hollowing grief.
I let it be there,
within me.
Being all of me.
The absence on my lips, my fingertips,
The nothingness around my shoulders,
and my cheek where once your chest was my cushion.
And then all at once, my heart remembered.
It remembered the keenness of my loss, and the size of my love.
And it sought to restore balance.
Then in it flooded,
Hot and golden and bright, so terribly bright.
It flowed into crevices and fissures long forgotten.
It filled every void and imperfection.
It swam in joyful recollection,
Over every nodule and every pang.
And I was remade.
The veins and seams glisten amidst the darkness
As it revolves within me.
As it spins, it brings tears.
As it spins, it brings smiles.
It spins so I may go on,
grateful and unbroken.
© Sarah Hunter
