when i move to the city
you do not follow

the subway goes by and sometimes
i catch the smell of newly cut grass

the only bars i go to are ones you went to in 1997
the only heartbeat that shadows mine is yours

here is a broken glass
here is a phone call from my brother
here is a dying animal

sometimes i roll my bones down south
and ask your blood pressure machine
are you tired of this game yet?

and the reading is always normal
and the cholesterol numbers tick down
and yet

there’s always the why of it
we’re always stuck on the why

why? because i loved you
like a sieve loves the sand that passed through it
like a screen loves the light that dies through it in the evening
like a diamond loves the drill that squeezes it into being

why? because all that love had to go somewhere

why? it was easy for me to close my eyes
tell myself, i’m falling into a pit,
and then to fall into that pit

Lindsey Siferd is a college admissions counselor moonlighting as a poet. She has previously been published in the Montucky Review, Cimarron Review, and the Atlanta Review. She lives in Brooklyn.