So Often When We Leave

So often when we leave we are no longer ourselves
and the people who remember us cannot.
All the things that ravage, overlay
and we become a gray
a dwindled voice
uncertain legs
a medication.

There's no fairness to the fact
that when we lose,
the lively face
the laugh
the springing gaiety
are bled away.
Photographs are paltry proxies for all that.

This is when I turn to dreams;
it is there I know
that as I try to understand
how I will return from Denmark
with all the extra bottles,
at any moment you may visit me
smiling,
and clearly I will see your face
and hear again your voice.

July 26 2013