This is the kind of day
Shrouded and cloaked in clouds and showers
A day with no exclamation marks
This is the kind of day when he would have called
To share a groaner of a pun
Match calendars for lunch
Or just to see if I was still alive
Which of course he isn’t
Some ghosts linger longer than others
I’ve had my share of losses over a lifetime
Sometimes it isn’t the pain of the loss as much
As it’s empathy with the bereaved
Like the time a classmate’s younger brother
Was struck down in a traffic accident
I will always be haunted by the memory of his mother’s eyes
Noticed obliquely a few months later when I was over at their house
Her eyes shiny as polished chrome but full of grief’s infinity
Some ghosts seem bound to places
Where they passed or where we shared a moment
Or maybe a song will shuffle its way into a tendril
Of sweet remembrance
A recollection of spectral intensity
This is the kind of day
When spirits walk beside me
Shrouded and cloaked
In clouds and showers
David Trudel © 2013