I could know him, and like him,
       

without understanding,
like liner notes to a jazz album.

But liking doesn't lead to love.
You switch to a different axis.

A self-indulgent misery
is best, a cathartic performance
I perform myself.

I read that happy people have
an inaccurate sense of time.
The descent as slow falling. The dead
don't get any more dead.

When remembering him,
I'm never lonely.

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Copyright © 2018 Elisa Gabbert All rights reserved
from L'Heure Bleue, or the Judy Poems
Black Ocean
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission