How Stupidly We Squander

The terror grows larger,
swallows hope
and stars,
as her eyes begin
to bulge, rounded fingers
clutch air unable
to sink claws
into the nothing
her son
has become.
This woman is chasing
self-loathing
with grief, mind
moving far too quickly
toward loss
and resignation.

Having happened
upon her small son,
her two year old,
on the third floor
when the elevator
doors opened
to his what me grin, I got
to be the hero.
I placed her
heart in her hands
still beating
and smelling faintly
of shitty diapers
and fishy
Desitin.

It took
all the will
I had not to sob
with relief
drawn by a wooden
bucket from some
deep well
I still
don’t understand.

For love, you
would pray to a god
in which
you don’t believe
to give you death,
disease, insanity.
For love, you
would travel
to hell for the whatever
wherever, why because,
because, shhh because
it’s okay.
For love,
You would write
their name
one hundred times
on your graphing
calculator.
For love, you
would watch
them leave
and abandon you
as their heart
stopped beating.