After the funeral
the house felt wrong.
Not haunted.
That would have been simpler.
Only wrong
in the way cups on the table
and coats over chairs
and dishes in the sink
can keep doing their plain jobs
when one person is gone
and the room knows it.
People spoke softly
for a while,
which almost made it worse.
Forks touched plates.
Water ran.
Somebody asked who wanted tea.
I remember standing in the kitchen
looking out the window
thinking the whole world
ought to have paused one hour more.
Not forever.
One hour would have been enough
to let the truth sit down.