You will remember the last words he ever said

to you, before he knew, before you knew.

You will write them down on blank sheets

of paper, you will speak them out

to abandoned streets.

They will draw a map of what he meant

across your heart. You will listen again

to each one, play it, play it back. You will make

a loop of words as if to trap the moment

when he spoke them.

If there were no words, if he left none,

you will make them up or dream them.

You will wish each night, before you sleep,

for the dream in which

he speaks them,

and when time holds its breath at dawn,

you will sift through the crumpled hours

for the words you dreamed, as if

your finding them could keep him

breathing.

You could not invent his words,

you could not predict him,

how his smile was tilted, how

it lit the room

around him