You don't always know
how you know,
it comes slowly, the awareness.
With the certainty and final resignation
of a child learning there's no Santa Claus,
you just know.
The breakfast table, once a venue
for long dreamy stares
and coffee-flavored kisses,
becomes a silent stage
for reading the news,
eating breakfast, and
you just know.
The smell of his shirt
when you'd bury your face there,
the feel of his hands on your body
as if they had a life of their own,
all silently slip to a place
wherever memories go
to gather dust, and
you just know.
You miss the nights,
how his body and yours
breathed and moved as one.
Maybe it's the nights
and how they were
that give the knowing life, but
you just know.
Like ocean waves upon the sand,
love recedes
with all the other yesterdays
and you would trade
all your tomorrows
to have it back, but
you just know.
