The Empathetic Man

Night after night, your body’s presence bolsters mine.

But in the fall sky, I see flocks leave, and lapse into loneliness.

Like in my childhood, when a dog was hit by a car,

I felt the loss, even though I never had a dog.

First snow is precursor to the ache of a man apart.

So, I feel for the mallards on the icy pond.

And squirrels that forage in the hardbound earth.

Or the apples that fall and are never eaten.

I take too hard these debilitating proxies:

the crystallized spider’s web,

even the coyote, as scrawny as it’s ever been,

as ragged as the half-drowned cat that I also pity.

In bed, though I hear your breath, I cannot imagine spring.

Not when the dim blue oak in the window is leafless.

And sleet pings against the glass like arrows.

And the wind whips the bare back of the air.

I may be in here and warm but something is out there and cold.

Therefore, I am out there. And I am cold.

And I look up at this house, thinking, “If only…if only…”

If only I was where I am. If only I was with the one I’m here beside.

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in North Dakota Quarterly and Lost Pilots. Latest books, ”Between Two Fires” and “Covert” are available through Amazon.