Sometimes I hold my own hand,
knowing it is not yours, but
it is the closest that I can come
to holding yours, and I squeeze it.
I know that it’s my own hand
I am squeezing, but I like to believe
that in some strange, miraculous way
we are one body and you can feel
not only the squeeze but the love
that rose up like a river in spring,
the love that is here even when
you are not, the love that then lets
the hand go. It is perhaps, just for me,
this little ritual, and I laugh to think
that perhaps it is as much control
as love, though I like to believe
that somewhere in another room
you look down at your empty hands
and wonder at how they feel
so suddenly warm, so surprisingly full.