It’s cold, darling, merely cold, but in your eyes the heavy ships sway in rich waters and the seamen whiz in the air in the failed abordage. You wander away from me during the day when I go through routine – closing the door upstairs, the creak of the hinge audible in my study, silently making your tea and leafing through your notes, the whisper of paper serene as the trees on a quiet afternoon. You barely breathe, it seems, yet when I catch you in the hallway and draw your veiled figure to my chest I can feel the expansion of your ribcage, fragile as a child’s, and when I trail my fingers over your face I feel little exhalations that please me so, as if the whole house is filled with you.
You don’t sleep very well, darling, and in the early hours of the dawn your back is straight and shoulders stiff as you sit up on our bed and look out the window, the barren landscape as mute as your face and the thin branches of trees as rusty as your hair. I am afraid to cease you in any way, and my hand rests in submission, only half-inch from touching your skin.
You are far away, darling, yet during the evenings I light the fire and cook you supper, and as the spoons and forks clink with ceramic I warm your wine and reach for your small hand, and the seas are calm for once. I kiss your temple and play with your hair as we listen to music into the night, old wordless records with scratches and faded jackets.
I sit on the porch and watch you walk through the trees, my heart quivering when I don’t see your for a long moment, and although I know that you will return eventually I dare not look somewhere else. I cannot tether you, darling, and so I watch you wander your seas, as a parent would watch a small wondrous child in his world and wait patiently for his return.
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