Swims

I can't get the image out of my head
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 Of when I held you right there
 
 And watched you die
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 Upstairs in the back bedroom of our house
 Where we have lived for many years
 
 Your last gasping breaths
 
 I see it again and again
 ♪
 As the breeze blew in
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 The room I still don't go in at night
 Because I see you
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 Your transformed, dying face will recede with time
 Is what our counselor said
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 Who we walked to every Monday holding hands
 Slower every week with your breathing
 Until we had to drive
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 But then only two months after you died
 Our counselor died
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 All at once, her empty office with no light on
 As if her work was done
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 We are all always so close to not existing at all
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 Except in the confusion of our survived-bys grasping at the echoes
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 Today our daughter asked me if mama swims
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 I told her, "Yes, she does
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 And that's probably all she does
 Now."
 What was you is now borne across waves
 Evaporating