The summer before I married again, I remembered
a particular passage, searched for it
amongst thousands of books, some shelved nicely,
others stacked haphazardly. Most of them had been his,
others belonged to both of us, some purely mine.

I had never lived in this house with him.
I had moved alone—tired furniture,
my mother’s china, toys and televisions, all those books,
and one pair of his jeans, which I plucked from the hook
where he’d last hung them.

When I found the desired tome and opened it,
a slip of paper fluttered down. His writing:    milk
                                                                coffee
                                                                bread
                                                                cat litter
                                                                macaroni and cheese
                                                                beer
                                                                wine
All the essentials.

Curious, I strode to another shelf, pulled a slim volume
from a towering stack, opened it.
A small, yellowed note, folded just so, marked a page.
Scribbled in his hand—angular,
youthful—a roughly drawn heart, an arrow, our initials.

In the following months, I gathered the books,
gave many away. I married,
moved to a freshly built house,
reshelved the remaining books
in the custom-built bookshelves.

There were no more accidental
communiques from the beyond.

Instead, a blessing whispered in my ear: drink the coffee
                                                             sip the wine
                                                             eat the bread
                                                             scoop the litter
                                                           pour the milk for the children
Love again.