On Ice Poem by Alexandra Reiss

You went to China to find yourself. And now? Geography separates us in body, in mind. Map spread across my bed sheets: unfolded. Blue, green, alone –- all these roads point to you.

And you are a mountain. And I am proud. But you are a mountain with uneven peaks –- too far away for me to love.

Mornings, we would peer out over miles of stark white bed sheet. It looked like Antarctica. Mornings, you’d be grumpy upon waking up: irritated in Antarctica.

Without you, the sheets only smell like bleach and the smoke on my hair. A bold torture, the evidence of our excess points and shakes its finger at me. You left me to take the blame.

Always far away. You have always been gone. But now that it’s official,

Who do I say
goodbye to?