![](/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/picture188.jpg?itok=rHp09VYH)
On the death of a friend
Sometimes I'm talking to everybody when I say why, why, why?
And somtimes I'm talking to no one at all because I don't want
your mellow-toned condolences.
I'm scared I don't feel enough, but
I"m certain it feels best to cry
and taste the salt
and know I'm alive.
It's worse to stare hopeless,
and repeat empty motions dry-eyed
with her name caught in my throat.
I'm a shallow-breathing shadow,
peering out of red-rimmed, foggy windows
at the cars passing by.
Innocently ignorant, they zip along in the usual rush.
I'm a clog in the traffic today,
stopped still in the crowd.
I feel what they can't even know,
I feel it for me now, and for them too.
I'm caught between the soulful heroine
who braves it all to live on for her,
and the hooded mourner
curled upon cold stone tiles.
Who can prepare?
Where do I begin?
Perhaps I am already the traveler.