the loss of your smell, a trail of guilt

I can't remember the last time I heard

your voice, your last voicemail trapped 

on an obsolete cellphone, the battery

dead and charger nowhere to be found.

I can still see your mother from my seat

on the sofa, the way her body bent

in pleas, lips quivering as they howled,

a mother should never have to bury her child.

I abandoned your house and my home-

town. Ran from your body caught on

record, dipped from the feel of lips

I could no longer put my finger on.

The loss of your smell, a trail of guilt

that led me every day to the doorstep

of want. I have been meaning to stop

by your mom's, to stand awhile

at the edge of that pond in the park,

to at least swing by your resting place

with microphone-shaped flowers—

hyacinths the color of purple rain.

[Alison C. Rollins, from 'For You', in Library of Small Catastrophes]