Chest Compressions

Muscles in my back. In my legs. Were sore. The day after. I noticed it less, the day after that. And I thought,
lamentation is not an acute sense of loss. It's not pain. Lamentation is the slow demise of memory, the erasure of evidence, the subtle, discrete awareness of parts of myself as they fade away. As they fade away.

We hardly know each other. And it's always been, and always will be, too late.

And I forgive you, and I forgive me,
but.

But.

Forever is a long time: If you braided
your hair and measured every single strand and laid them end to end to end and made a braid that long, then counted every single grain of sand on the beach, and every single missed phone call, and every single star in the sky, and all the grains of sand in the universe, every ladybug, cicada, thimble, smell of grass and ocean, trampoline bounce, dirty sock, and every time I forgot your birthday, and every time I didn't save you from the World it
wouldn't rate
a blink.

Our mother slept on the couch that night. After she kissed you on the forehead. After they left with you. After she asked them to cut a lock of your hair for her. After I made the phone calls, after, after. After you left, after everyone else left. I went upstairs and
cleaned the bedroom floor
pieces of plastic
syringe caps
gauze and little drops of
blood
bits of hair that
didn't make it into
the zip lock bag.
So that she wouldn't have to see it.
You're welcome.

But I forgive you, and I forgive me,
and.
It doesn't matter because, but
we're all failures and I forgive all of us,
but. Our failures are communal, and it wasn't my fault, and it was everyone's fault, and we're all guilty,
but.

But I'm the one here
Beating your heart.
Counting.
Breathing.
Beating your heart.
Counting.
Breathing.
Beating your heart.
Counting.
Breathing.
Beating your heart.