Locard’s Principle

It is easy to see the physical signs of someone gone:
the hairs left on pillows, the fingerprint left on a glass
left by the sink, the line etched into a wall where height
was recorded until the recorded was never going to get
any taller. It is not as easy

to see the smaller traces left behind: the indent in a pillow
slowly regaining its shape, the glass left in the cupboard
that won’t be drunk from again by the same lips, the lines
on faces that won’t appear because they only come with age.
It is nearly impossible

to see the things taken away with the one who has gone:
the color bled from hair with worry, the glass that is picked
up and set down and picked up too many times because the hands
just need to be doing something, the lines studied on the palms
of hands because your fortune never told you that this is what
would happen, that this is loss

and it is irrevocable. This evidence
is the evidence that does not forget because you cannot forget.