Fear of Stones and Air

So it has come to pass and not to pass.

I will have no child with the woman I love.

No want, no wish, no fault, nor purpose.

What to do with these amazing mountains

of emptiness but put them in my pocket

like small, smooth stones and walk alone

to the river. Once at the midpoint of the bridge,

I will pull them out to drop them one by one.

To release them from the pinch of my okay.

To lean out over the rail and see how the wind

and the motion below will bend their paths.

To listen for their sound and only imagine

I hear the plunge and splash

and feel the waters rolling each into its bed.

Their weight I shall know by what is lessened

from my hand, from my person, by what

goes missing there. A life turned into air.