I Laugh
by Robert Okaji
Because I say to myself I’m going to
miss her so much, when no, I won’t miss any-
one, because I’ll be dead. I won’t be thinking.
Or feeling, or remembering. I simply
won’t be. So I’m grieving now, well in advance
(I hope), though the drugs quit on me and my knee
swells and the lead balloon in my chest expands
even as I write and eat cookies because
everything else tastes like sawdust. I miss her
so much now, even though she’s here, more present
than anyone, ever. Because I won’t be.
Robert Okaji served without distinction in the U.S. Navy, and once owned a bookstore. Sixteen months ago he was diagnosed with late stage metastatic lung cancer. Thanks to the wonders of modern science, he still lives in Indiana with his wife—poet Stephanie L. Harper, whose poems resonate with emotion and craft—stepson, and cat. His first full-length collection, Our Loveliest Bruises, will be published by 3: A Taos Press in fall 2024, and his poetry may be found in Only Poems, Big Windows Review, Verse Daily, Broadkill Review, Vox Populi, Taos Poetry Journal, wildness, and at his blog, O at the Edges.