The weight of you

When too much, is too much.

I thought the distance would burn you out of me,
that the chaos of orders, the constant press of noise, would cauterize what I carried.

Instead, the sound of your voice was replaced by the sound of men gasping under my hands,
blood slipping hot and impossible through my fingers.

I was trained to save them, but I didn’t always.
And every time I failed, the loss pressed heavier against my body,
adding to the weight of you, the first loss I carried.

The one that cradled all the rest.

It bent me, bowed me, until I couldn’t tell which grief I was walking under anymore.