In His Absence

Chris and Me on our camping trip in Diamond Canyon

Your touch haunts my skin;
Frail memory brings back
A hint of your breath
On my shoulder.

In my dreams you come,
But flee with the dawn--
And I am left here,
Reaching for you.

Return him to me,
Creator Of Love.
Spare my heart the ache
Of solitude.

Yet such brief sorrow
Will I embrace now,
With hope of a shared
Life tomorrow.

I wrote this late one night last week. It is the thought process that I cycle through almost nightly...I slowly lose consciousness, and in that half-asleep, half-awake stage, I can almost feel him here--his fingertips on my cheek, his arm wrapped around my waist. I fall asleep, and dream of him. Sometimes I reach out to touch him, and I wake up to see that I am alone in my bed, with my roommate breathing quietly near me. Last night I dreamed that I was in Texas for his graduation, and I woke up to remember that he has only been gone two weeks.

Inevitably, I feel a wave of loneliness and exhaustion at this time. I roll over in bed and cry, or I pull on his sweater and sit in the hall with his letters and read them over and over and over and cry there. I pray bitterly.

When I am done crying and praying that he will magically appear, I feel a stillness--or exhaustion--sweep over me, and I remember him telling me that it will all be worth it in the end. I think of how proud I am of him for what he is doing, and I remember that he is struggling, too. I go back to sleep with renewed commitment and hope for the future, and with the knowledge that even if I can't have him now, I can be with him for eternity.