the sun that swallowed you

Death is oh so strange

What I would give to go back to this moment

Wrestling in the water until the horizon swallowed the sun

Algae and bug spray and pinecones filling my nostrils

Sacrificing my bare shoulders to the mosquitos for just a few more minutes

Oh to be so blissfully unaware that we were running out of time

That the horizon would swallow the sun and the moon

And take you with it

That sunsets on the water would never feel the same again

I miss you and I’m aching. 

I’m still swimming, wrestling the waves where you used to be.

Oh what I would give to hear your voice again

To be tossed into the deep end because I’m a sulking teenager who needs to be a kid again

To be thrown over your shoulder because I’m still a kid who’s scared to grow up

A kid who doesn’t know you’re dying.

Oh what I would give to be atop your shoulders in a freezing lake on a summer evening

To be in the space between

True naivete and brutal reality

To be where childhood and adulthood are as indistinguishable as the fading sun

I’m a woman now

And I still miss your shoulders

I still miss the mosquitoes preying on my skin

I miss the sticks in the sand poking my ankles

And the water clogging my ears

I miss the days where I just existed, living and breathing and waiting for the sun to kiss our precious summer air goodnight and swallow us all.