it’s late, even for me, and here’s an elegy to max

outside the grocery store at night, i'm pushing

an empty cart into its rack and it's raining out.

that little room inbetween the automatic sliding

doors- between outside and groceries- where the

wind blows strands of hair in my face, i think

of you. it's almost like we all pause in that little

room to collect ourselves, a gush of air sobers us

enough to push through the grocery aisles. i am

thinking of your hands pushing my tangled hair

back. i always wished it was windy just so that you

would do that. outside, the rain is leaving a reflection on

the asphalt, and this deep streetlight-gold color is

swimming there. the other grocery store people are

stepping in it, dipping little bits of gold on the

edges of their shoes, i watch it run off.

it turns orange and i am sinking. no not

orange, no. because orange is warm bread and

your poetry, forgiveness and the saxophone. it's the

sun bleeding against the horizon, your favorite

candle, and the shadowed folds between white sheets.

the colored squares of light from a stranger's kitchen

windows. it's fall leaves like a burning ember

whispering 'die with me', it's fridays and vhs tapes

with old videos of us dancing, it's the way your hand

felt on my back. it's orange and it's you, and suddenly

this ripping feeling in my chest. i'm rushing to my car,

because grocery stores on rainy nights are those little

empty human moments where we all feel a strange

yearning feeling. the empty pockets, like getting home

from a trip, standing up from a restaurant table, slamming

the car door, hanging up the phone, walking alone, and

that moment in the dark before sleeping. a vulnerable

aching feeling, like something is ending all too soon, all

too empty. i am leaving the grocery store with rain on my

windshield and food in a bag. my left signal is clicking loud in the

quiet, the street looks so lonely, my hair is in my face.

it's the little things inbetween distraction, where

we're alone with ourselves suddenly feeling very small.

before now, they were the biggest part of our life, you made

the little human things mean i love you. they are so so loud now, it is all

over now. max, i am driving home alone tonight,

and though it is the fourteenth time since you are gone,

it feels like the first

time i am driving home

without your hand pushing my hair back.