The sun rises anyway,

indifferent to absence,

painting the same golden squares

across your empty bed.
Coffee brews in kitchens

where your name will be spoken

in past tense for the first time,

voices breaking on the syllables.
Your phone buzzes with messages

that will never find you—

lunch plans, inside jokes,

the ordinary love of ordinary days.
Someone will have to call your work,

cancel your dentist appointment,

decide what to do with the milk

that expires next Tuesday.
The world keeps its appointments

while those who loved you learn

to navigate the sudden geography

of a life with you-shaped holes.
Your favorite song plays on the radio

in a car where someone weeps,

remembering how you hummed along,

fingers drumming the dashboard.
The morning after is not an ending—

it's the first day of everyone else

learning to carry the weight

of all your unfinished stories.