Everyone Who Left Us

I clipped and saved this poem from The Atlantic Monthly in April, 2000 and have moved it from notebook to notebook. Over the years, I have returned to it several times. I find it’s message very powerful and moving. I am also fascinated by the line-rhyming technique the poet used in constructing it. The verse rhythm works so well with the mood of the poem and is technically incredible. I hope you will find as much in it as I have.

EVERYONE WHO LEFT US

Everyone who left us we find everywhere.
It’s easier now to look them in the eyes —
A gravesites, in bed, when the phone rings.
Of course, we wonder if they think of us.

It’s easier now to look them in the eyes,
Imagine touching a hand, listening to them talk.
Of course, we wonder if they think of us
When nights, like tonight, turn salty, warm.

Imagine touching a hand, listening to them talk—
Hard to believe they’re capable of such coldness.
When nights, like tonight, turn salty, warm,
We think of calling them, leaving messages.

Hard to believe they’re capable of such coldness—
No color, no pulse, not even a nerve reaction.
We think of calling them, leaving them messages
Vivid with news we’re sure they’d want to know.

No color, no pulse, not even a nerve reaction:
We close our eyes in order not to see them.
Vivid with news we’re sure they’d want to know
We don’t blame them, really. They weren’t cruel.

We close our eyes in order not to see them
Reading, making love, or falling asleep.
We don’t blame them. Really, they weren’t cruel,
Though it hurts every time we think of them

Reading, making love, or falling asleep,
Enjoying the usual pleasures and boredoms,
Though it hurts every time we think of them
Like a taste we can’t swallow. Their names stay,

Enjoying the usual pleasures and boredoms,
Then they leave us the look of their faces
Like a taste we can’t swallow. Their names stay,
Diminishing our own, getting in the way

At gravesites, in bed, when the phone rings.
Everyone who left us we find everywhere,
Then they leave us, the look of their faces
Diminishing, our own getting in the way.

— Steven Cramer

(The Atlantic Monthly, April 2000, p. 108.)