I find someone else receiving the version I built inside the hospital roof garden. I ask the question I kept postponing.

I see you inside the hospital roof garden before I prepare my face.

I notice mint crushed beneath my palm clinging to the silence around us.

I recognize a visitor badge before I trust your smile.

I remember why I need my labor to stop looking like their luck.

I stay as the doctor calls you family and calls me visitor.

I let my voice cross the distance first.

I watch your eyes move toward the glass stairwell instead of mine.

I recall your forehead resting against mine after midnight.

I hate how tenderness survives the agreement that ends it.

I refuse another beautiful description of someone else receiving the version I built.

I feel your silence choose its first casualty.

I fold my fingers around a visitor badge beneath the table.

I listen as you describe the life around your answer.

I stop translating after I learn that you give them the patience I taught you.

I feel grief enter before the sentence ends.

I walk to the glass stairwell with your footsteps behind me.

I hear you ask me not to leave yet.

I look up and find your mouth too near mine.

I let hope rise once, against everything I know.

I reach for you inside the hospital roof garden, but you give them the patience I taught you.