More Months Than 6







It’s been a long while
since I’ve heard from you by email
and I’m just wondering if you’re ok;
it seems like months since you’ve sent me
an “I’m doing ok, just busy” email
and I wonder when I think about you
if you're in trouble
if you’ve got yourself
in over your head in some way.
We used to talk all the time
until you moved to New York
the woods of New York, not the city, actually;
I hope you’ve been finding
a little bit of happiness out there,
but when you disappear from my radar
for several months at a time
I wonder of someone has done something to you;
I wonder if you’ve done something to yourself.

Have you changed who you are?
Have you become someone new?
Have you made some decisions
that require you to say goodbye?
I wonder if you will even read this email,
let alone reply to it; has your love
turned into something dangerous?
Did you think you were moving in
with someone who cared for you
only to find out that it was a trap
and that you’ll never find your way
back to your friends?

I wish you would at least send me a picture,
something to let me know
you haven’t been hurt,
something to let me know you’re intact
something to let me know
the sunlight doesn’t hurt you,
something to let me know
you have your freedom
and that you just need some time,
a year to yourself; it feels like a year;
it feels like many more months than 6.
I remember there was a time
when we used to talk practically every day
and then I moved away
and then you moved away
and suddenly there were
thousands of miles between us
and we both talked about
promising to each other
that we’d write and stay in contact
but the sunlight here is gone
from the kitchen counter top
and it’s gone running behind the hills, now
and I don’t know how long the night
is supposed to go on for.

When do you even check your email?
At this point I’d even take a text
just to know that you’re alive
and not stuck in some horror movie somewhere;
I wonder if you are scared of New York.
I wonder if you are scared of the woods
that line both sides of the highway out there.
I wonder if you’re scared of getting on a plane
and coming back home to see me
and the rest of your friends who miss you.
Are you afraid to tell that person you’re with
that you miss me, that you miss us,
that you just want to come back home
for a little while?
I wonder also if maybe I might have
said something to you in an email
that would make you not want to talk to me anymore;
I’ve just been sitting here at my desk
that’s been growing larger and larger
all this time, waiting to hear back from you,
every edge and side of this desk
expanding out in all directions.

The piano notes are lasting longer and longer
and whoever it is that’s playing that song
is hitting the lower chords harder;
I can still see your face
and if I was good at drawing
I could draw you from memory;
I could describe you perfectly,
at least the way that you were
the last time I hugged you goodbye,
the last time I hugged you
and felt your kiss on my cheek.







Copyright © 2011 by Rich Boucher.