Five nights ago I said
'do not tell me when you pack up your life-suit into an overnight bag
and aim your knees at runways',

those words came farther
than from the bottom of a wine glass,

sometimes I ache
in places I cannot name,

so I'd rather not try and say
what my swelling organs should.

I promised myself I would not hold suction cups to your front door
or paint stop signs on your wallpaper, or send out SOS messages
in Morse code when I should really be saying goodbye

with smiles and a good luck wink. But I was told not to make promises
I can't keep.

You say these things and I want to cover my womb up,
ashamed of the dry patches between my hipbones.  

and I remember things like

us laid in a room punching the air away,
re-naming our hands and counting thread veins,
we were 10 years old again
telling secrets from different corners
of the mattress.

I remember things like the day you bleached your hair
and said you were leaving,
I put my forehead down and cried into places you could not see.

I told you I was picking grout from the floor tiles so I would not have to look up
and tell you

'I am afraid'.

This is not a brother in Australia, or a friend that changes plans,
it's not a boyfriend that says 'I don't' the same time I confess
'I do',

it's not a mother who is disappointed
or a father that yells, then breaks DVD players
and bathroom tiles with angry teeth.

It's more than that
and my cold bones know it.