The Christmas tree stand is dirty from the lot
where it was purchased under the freeway
Not enough ornaments and
too many lights

You’re gone in much the same way
Nothing spectacular
polaroids have lost their stick
stains on the rug
the clock hands stuck back before daylight savings time,
always an hour closer to the end than the rest of us

You kept asking, “What time is it?” as though time still applied to you

A pink velour jacket with a hole in the sleeve that two of us wrestle
upon your stiffening body
The botched nature of final wishes
It won’t ever be anything more
than this

Nowhere did anyone count
the number of times you told me
I didn’t love you
or that my love saved you,
again and again

No final tally, but they are over now and there is a number, even if I don’t know it

Number of times we walked to the grocery store,
picked our lunches, ate together,
while you asked me to tell you something
intimate about my life,
as though your life depended on it

What might be large enough to hold this lifetime of grief?
The sadness seems infinite and yet
something earthly could hold it
Them.
The tears.
The Pacific Ocean.