we are the browns

She is a year ago.

She is the ache in the empty,
the first time you changed your mind
and the last time you were sorry about it.

She is a city sleeping beside you, warm and vast and familiar, streetlights

yawning and stretching, and you have never. 

You have never.

You have never loved someone like this.

She is your first stomach ache.

Your first panic attack and your favorite cold shower.

A mountain is moving somewhere inside of you, and her handprints are all over it.

Here.

Here. 

Here, you love her.

In the fractured morning, full of too tired and too sad, she is the first foot that leaves the bed.

She is the fight in you, the winning and the losing battle floating like a shipwreck in your chest.

When they ask you what your favorite moment is,

You will say say Her.

You will always say Her.

- Caitlyn Siehl