there are days i shake.

not like a leaf on a tree;

not like a nervous voice.

nothing like poetry.

there is no nostalgia in the way my body quivers.

my limbs are not taut like a bowstring waiting to be released.

my hands are not humming with music unsung.

i shake;

i tremble,

and i cannot breathe—

is it something in my veins,

or is it absence of that turns my arms into an earthquake?



maybe it is the shaking

that rends the foundations of my head,

splitting all grounds of reason in my mind

with the force of my quaking.

that is why it rhymes with aching—

maybe this is where it becomes something like poetry.

the weight of absence presses behind my eyes.

i am not sure if i have lost something,

because i am not sure i ever had

what i am looking for,

but I do know i am missing.