Indian Summer (from my new collection, ‘Poetry for the Newly Single Forty Something’)
It seemed as though behind me,
the grieving process had begun.
First, shock at your passing,
deliberate, yet unforeseen,
tears swamped my eyes,
never far away.
I could hide in shadows
or gaze at clouds,
trying to escape them
but they always discovered me.
I could barely believe you had gone.
But as dawn and dusk
Continued to spool over one another,
I realised I was still breathing
And slowly my smile came back,
I knew I could go on
without you.
Until unexpectedly and uninvited
as quickly as you had departed,
you returned.
Maria Stephenson