BEREAVEMENT
On my desk, I keep a photo of my late wife.
It’s been almost a year.
She looks up, ever alive, ever beautiful.
The marrow in my bones still hurts.
I know, everyone dies.
Everyone experiences loss.
I am not Churchill fighting Hitler,
not even Michael Phelps
struggling to win a gold medal,
and yet in my office, at my desk,
breath by breath, moment by moment,
it still hurts to wrap my mind
around the catastrophic edges
of my world.