Aftertaste (2026)

I still reach for you

in tiny ways.

Not with hands anymore,

but with habits

through a softened daze.

I still turn

when laughter sounds like yours.

I still pause at all of your favorite songs

like they might explain

what happened to us better than we could

Grief is embarrassing that way.

It survives in ordinary places.

In the whites of the waves.

In the soil that nurtures the willow trees.

In the split second before sleep

when my body forgets

you’re no longer beside me.

I think that is the cruelest part:

how love leaves slowly,

but never fully.

Like perfume trapped in fabric,

refusing to wash out

no matter how many times

I try to become new again.

M.H. John