You Need to Condense

says the Delta agent, 
so I condense, 
concentrating
on making myself 
colder & smaller 
like the last tear 
hung from my chin 
as I leaned down
to kiss you goodbye 
sister, yesterday
at your service.

I will never forget 
your face, puzzled, 
on the satin pillow, 
nor the wince
of its complex pleats. 
I will never forget 
your voice
in the last hours,
trying to make words 
for I’m sorry
& I’m not sorry at all.

But now I must cool 
grief into something 
compact I can carry.
The trick is focus 
on the meniscus, 
not overwhelm
at the brim. Too much
heat & I’ll be mist, 
drawn into the seared 
sun of your suffering.
Too much cold

& I’ll fall, back into 
our childhood, its 
black ice & green 
grass, picnics 
made by the small, 
hard hands that 
nursed everyone 
but yourself. I wish
I’d been there more, 
or more there while 
you were living.

No one could save her 
we all kept saying, 
not from herself—
but do we believe it? 
I cannot, but now 
it’s time to board,
& I must harden 
enough to remain
a trembled suspense 
in the cloud of what 
cannot be known.

Hold me, sky. 
Keep me aloft.
Let tears well, 
but be dammed. 
We’ll land soon, 
& then the pain 
can apocalypse,
splitting the dome 
of every memory. 
I’ll be home then,
 where I can let go 
at last, as rain.