It’s reflex
to set the fourth place.
My arms
move quick
across the dinner table.
Then I pull them back
like children
in danger.
People don’t understand –
It’s not just the Big Obvious Days.
It’s The Impossible Minutiae
of Ordinary Moments.
It’s catching a glimpse
of your shoes, kicked off,
by the door.
It’s the papercut
from your paperwork.
It’s a standard Wednesday.
It’s the word “never.”
It’s your empty baseball mitt from high school.
It’s the feel of your bat in my hands
because I heard a noise in the night.
It’s a fucking piece of mail with your name on it.
It’s your last coffee cup.
It’s your mother’s breath.
It’s every photo before we met.
It’s our boys’ tears
filled with hot baked grief.
It’s that you’ve never come in fourth place in your life.
About Amanda Crane
Amanda thought March 4th, 2020, would be just another normal morning until her husband, Ed, went into cardiac arrest due to his heart condition, HCM, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. There was a 1% chance of sudden death, but he passed that day. He was 40 years young, and they had been married for 14 years. One week later the world went into lockdown due to Covid, and Amanda and her two small sons, who were 9 and 11, would be left grieving during the strangest of times.
During this time, writing was the only way Amanda could cope. She wrote the manuscript The Queen of Joyful Things, which are poems about losing her husband. She is happy to be a part of the Hope for Widows community and hopes her story will help other young widows. You can visit her at: https://amcrane76.wixsite.com/www-amanda-crane-wix