“Without,” a Poem by John Freeman

Without

Maybe one day I will learn how to live
without, without her and her, and she and
them, without him. Lately, I am mostly
absence. I have lived so long within
my body’s clever disguise, so complete
this heart, these eyes. But maybe a body’s

largely past tense. Like a house empty but
for hours a chill blows through it. Maybe
I am like wind briefly still, a column
of air that found a form to fill. Waiting
for a sign to go where wind goes when it’s
not with us—when without becomes within.

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Excerpted from Wind, Trees by John Freeman. Copyright © 2022. Available from Copper Canyon Press.