for Max, whose continued absence is an ache in my soul

---

the missing of you

is starting to feel like a small animal

gnawing at my heart

at my stomach

my world isn’t quite right

when I can’t be sure

that you are still in it

you have severed yourself from all the usual

technologies that you find so cold

sources of connected disconnection

I admire your ability to so fully reject this modern technology

but it leaves me with hands empty of you

my dear friend

I think about placing a call the old-fashioned way

but I am all out of quarters

and payphones have become almost extinct

only found in the Smithsonian

next to a manual typewriter

and Archie Bunker’s La-Z-Boy

you wouldn’t open the door

to a stranger

if I sent a telegram

I know you would appreciate the whimsy

of a tin can stretched between our houses

but I don’t have 2,700 miles of string

I try to connect with you through the ether

grab the thread of your vibrating frequency

but your beautiful colors are not calling out to me

the way they usually do

I must resort to inscribing a message

into the night sky

letting you know that you are loved

that you are missed

and hope that wherever you are

that you are looking up at the heavens

 

© 2017 Christine Elizabeth Ray – All rights Reserved