an absence

i looked at the moment
where sadness, quivering
inside a body, is on its way out,
in the face.

the underside of soiled sheets,
the word ‘sheets’ deserved to be repeated here,
the tenderness, the silent junction
(lamb, numb, dumb, bomb) of succumbing –
where a letter voices an absence.
the turbid rankness of soil after a storm

the decision to, the decision to leave.