I got you through the winter,

willing to be the steps behind you,

the traces and threads of what broke

you untie the closer we get 

to where you came from.

And anything that was ever special,

anything about me that ever illuminated

your eyes may already be leaving

cell by patient cell,

frame by frame.

So I drove the coast alone, by trees swaying

in wind, trying to tear free from roots,

by sands that are a smooth, unchanged 

blanket of still grains. There

were places still untouched, lonely

shores, canyons and forests

that never echo with us.

I get through seasons, mark and note the years,

the traces that eyes and skin and vows can leave on 

someone, how one person can be the place you come from.

And anything that was ever close, anything about me 

that ever kept you safe may be there flickering,

glow by glow, pulse by pulse.

So I moved through you as you moved through me by 

the dark corners you showed, the roots too entangled to

tear out now by places changed, marked and unknowable,

specters that move me through seasons back to where I came from.