the delivery

any minute now a large van will pull up outside. inside this van will be two men, sweaty and aggravated from their rush-hour commute to my doorstep. they will smile, though, because this is afterall their job, and in me they expect an excited customer, relieved by their arrival, grateful that this once distant time has come. with their arrival, they know, i will have come to the end of my waiting for the shipment of all my things from new york to where i am now, melbourne, australia.

my shipment. those boxes. the remains of my old life, our old life, our fingerprints intertwined on every box, his smell mixed with my smell, our socks thrown in together, our photos layering each other as we used to lay, folded into each other and asleep. all our clothes folded neatly, our candle holders and ornamets bubblewrapped, padded with care.

the life in these things is thin now. thin and emaciated from lack of sustenance, no love of late to fatten the heart of things in those boxes. no conversation to fill out the empty spaces. no sharing or making of plans to make the layers of tape burst at the seams.

the men will bring them inside. put them there, i will say. they will lay them out.

and there the boxes will lie. like so many caskets. like a memory morgue in my living room.

and this is the end of my waiting. this is what six years of waiting has delivered.

they are here.