It hangs in mid-air,
swaying through the trees,
like an echo,
sometimes,
and other times,
like a scream.
That life unfinished,
the one we didn’t get to have,
because you died.
It lingers there,
in the breeze,
like a hundred-thousand question marks,
and never any answer.
That life unfinished haunts me sometimes.
I wish I had a book I could read,
that told the rest of our story.
What would have happened,
had you not died.
All the things,
the many things,
that remain,
as part our future,
now only in my mind.
It messes with me,
sometimes.
That life.
What would our home have looked like?
Would we have moved to New York, like we talked about?
Or would we have had the family we smiled and laughed about,
while lying in bed, holding hands,
dreaming of the future.
Would we have been pregnant?
Maybe that wouldnt have worked out,
at my age,
maybe it would have been difficult,
or not possible.
I dont know.
Maybe we would have adopted,
the way you wanted to,
the way you talked about helping out a kid,
who needed us.
Would we have grown old together?
Yes.
I like to think so.
I like to think that if you had lived
we would have been together forever,
until we got very old,
and then maybe we could be one of those couples
that I am so jealous of,
who die only weeks or days or hours
apart,
because their connection is that vital,
and they simply cannot go on,
without the other.
But that’s not what happened.
No.
You died.
And I died.
Except I had to keep on living.
And that,
was by far,
the hardest thing I have ever done.
Figuring out this world,
without you in it.
It’s hard.
Really impossibly hard.
And even though I have found my joy again,
and I am beginning
my next great love story,
ours never finished,
and I carry that wonder
and that cloudy horizon
with me,
in a jar that is my heart.
And when I miss you,
I try to imagine pieces
of that life,
and what it might look like now.
Does it help?
Sometimes.
Not always.
But it makes me smile,
to think of us being content and old,
still holding hands,
as we walk down the street.
It makes me feel satisfied,
to put together the rest of our puzzle,
even if its only in my imagination.
For my dreams and images,
are so much more peaceful to live with,
than the haunting,
of a life unfinished.
