Scent

It's not new-mown grass,
Or fresh-baked bread,
Or that jumper my mother knit me.
The one I never wore
But couldn't throw out,
Because it smelled
Of so much mother-love.
It's your skin.
It smells of blackness:
Like the memory of fire
Up a morning chimney,
And the depth of a cat's shadow
Leaping under a puddle,
And the falling weight of your hair
As you laugh in some far-flung bar,
The just-snuffed candlelight
On tables-for-two,
The spaces between stars.
This is the scent of you.

I guess part of the problem was
The way my imagination rushed
Into the blackness and filled it.
It was all my fault.
I mistook so many
Beautiful, invisible things
For you.