Hello/Goodbye

If you had known

before you signed the book-

agreeing to this mortal life-

that you would know

first hand

first heart

what it would be

to rise up out of yourself in ecstacy-

to fold down into yourself in grief-

that you would hand your heart to someone

who would later, hand it back

scarred, with missing pieces-

the only evidence of an entwined life that would,

forever

define love for you…

If you had known

that those two-syllable words

would start your world

and stop it

in the seconds it would take to say them-

would you have said hello

knowing that goodbye was destined?