Windowless Room

There is a crack from ceiling to floor
that grows with the rising heat.
My soul trembles into the seams
of this windowless room,
leaving your residue behind
for me to carry
into the night.
I can’t pull hard enough
on this rope that holds you
at the other end.
I’ve been given a death sentence
I can’t ignore
or deny.
Exhausted from the grieving
and desperate for a new normal
without you.
I continue to do
all I know how to do—
suffer
in silence.

“Grief is a most peculiar thing; we’re so helpless in the face of it. It’s like a window that will simply open of its own accord. The room grows cold, and we can do nothing but shiver. But it opens a little less each time, and a little less; and one day we wonder what has become of it.”
—Arthur Golden, Memoirs of a Geisha