Leaving

What Love Cannot Do
January Gill O'Neil

It cannot save itself when it expires
like a tire’s slow leak. It cannot bring back
the greediness of youth

mouth on mouth,
skin on skin, that gnawing,
that longing you carried

until the next time
and then there is no next time.

You never see it coming but always see it leaving.

It waits by the door, bags packed,
full of stones from your life.

What it can do is mark
the distance between Point A and Point B,

which feels like a galaxy,
every star you ever wished upon
imploding before your eyes.