Loss

something in my bones aches just at the thought of you

of your arms, those skinny arms that always held those hospital bracelets

(how could you possibly bear that weight?

I know I can't)

and you are radiant, you are more than human, you are angelic

but now replacing every "are" with "were" seems like a chore

so I'll sit here staring at the words I wrote in love with you

and relish them in the pain of your absence

the most beautiful part of you was your joy

your bravery, how you could laugh in the worst of situations

how you could look right past my prying eyes into the great beyond, 

you knew you were going to die but maybe you were okay with that

you died as you lived, the cancer was never yours

it was my love that fell upon you as a burden

I am the rainstorm and you are the blizzard, couldn't we work out?

no, we could never have worked out

I speak of you only in honor

and in the fact that I didn't deserve you

it seems to me you never existed

you're there, in a corner of my mind, radiating the same life they put into you

in tubes, trying to fill you up

when you were already so whole

and maybe your almost-fourteen years were enough for you

so I should stop crying, as if they were my loss