advent journal: without you

without you

if I quote the words you can
probably say them with me
“you’ve been given a great gift
George: a chance to see what the
world would be like without you”

but the gift of without that
most of us get comes wrapped
as grief the chance to learn
what the world is like without
someone we are used to seeing

yet the presence of their absence
is still not enough to persuade
us that the fingerprints we leave
are more than evidence of our
failures faults and near misses

the real gift was not that George
saw a world without him but that
Mary was out looking for him
his dream of absence was a reality
she was not willing to abide

we all have that to offer one
other to say life without you
is hard you have been on my
mind down all these years
I am not me without you

we are a collage of compassion
shaped by incidental contact
the daily gestures that grant
us access to each other’s lives
that make us friends and family

Peace,
Milton

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