In memory of Shane Evans Willinger 1987-2025
What do we do on the day you died?
Since you die every day since that day
The day that is the book end to the day you were born
10 days after your due date
The day that follows the dash that represents
all the days you lived—13,923 after
Your plump red body exited mine
and the midwife placed you on my swollen belly
the swirls of your dark hair streaked cream with vernix
Your eyes lit up with the astonishment of being alive
What do we do now that we’ve lived the truth of the poet
who christened April the cruelest month?
When on that day we sat in a theater
in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge
Watching a play by Chekhov in which an actor fired a gun
That made a hole in your skull
through which your soul made its exit
900 miles away?
There are moments when we confuse living with you dead
With waiting and counting the days until you were born
We feel the same deep yearning
But counting the days only
takes us back to the day you died
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