There’s a moment
when you’re
grieving
you forget.
It’s the
quarter-
second glint
when you peek up
at
the solstice;
your first
banana sundae
since it
happened. The
stain that’s on
your T-
shirt once
you’re home—
it hadn’t been
washed
since …
You’ll catch
yourself in
chuckles
from the sitcom
in her
cache—
this isn’t
the time for Netflix—
that pang of
guilt
that judges with
its wig:
how dare
you play
at happy.
The first time
you’ll
awake it’s
slipped your
mind—
albeit for a
splinter of
a breath. Today
we’re—
The first
dream’s worst of
all. Your
belovѐd
lives &
waits
upon a bench
down by the
brook. The
apogee of hair
still
there. Every
wing of
bird is
lingering
with her. You
have to recall the
one that is her
namesake:
the lark we
christened Barbra.
You remember she
dropped the
e—between the
2nd
b & r. It
never makes a sound
so what’s
the point? What you
can’t elicit—even by a
welling in the
iris—
is how it
takes to heaven—
the instant
twigs
beneath your
shoe are
cracked in two.
This is a poem
of bones
and not of
beauty.
How brittle they
become
once the
marrow’s
been usurped. A
snap
that’s not
forsaken
despite the
volume set
to max on her
favourite
song. You put one
foot past
the other but
not in
dance. For how
can you
think to frolic?
You’re
only wiping
dishes—the plate on
which she
slurped her
final crumbs,
while you stood
amid the gloam
& feigned a smile.
Andreas Gripp
June 20, 2026
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