Trace Elements - Poem from Revenant as Erosion

Poem from 'Revenant as Erosion:' a six poem sequence on absence and return

II. trace elements

Forgotten, thankful
how I dealt with time passing
in our leisure–
in my compulsive mind–
the sun had set.

Rain louder than crickets
ousted the cherry ember of our fire.
Away we walked, separate.

Morning dew dries
years like tears blinked away.

Yet when ancient smoke rises
it finds us both–
wind to flame
an echo of a snap feeling–
trepidatious fingers reach
for your touch as we
wander, blindly suffocating in density.

That sticky yellow scent lingers
like your embrace, a saccharine last memory
so tender, arms surrounding
in a cave warmed
by your clementine pulse.

Now the air is empty and distant.
Arrow’s fletching of fear
whizzes past, sharp
breeze of ice on
my cheek, cold fast teardrop
seeks dissolution in
your worn shirt–
head between my knees

smoke pangs–sodden through
those delicate fibers of yours,
precarity threaded into shelter
as I trace fervent
for scents of dust and soap.

I clutch that beaten plaid
small square fabric of lost time
against my solemn heart–
clouded ghosts forever woven into
my last remnant
my only proof.

This poem is part of Revenant as Erosion —
a six-poem meditation on vanishing, return, and the thresholds between.

Read the full sequence: