Often, when I share some story
about my late husband, 
people ask if I miss him. My reply,
a simple yes, but what I really want to say
is how I miss the sacred of everyday.

Even another Steven Segal action flick, 
when he’d push pause on the VCR 
and ask, did you hear that bone snap? 
A glint in his hazel eyes, 
he’d rewind and play the scene again.
And if I covered my face, he’d say, Ahhhh
you missed it and played the dang thing again.

I want to rattle on about how the man 
loathed mornings yet morphed 
into John Wayne in some cowboy movie
booming, We’re burning daylight
first day of vacation at 0-dark-thirty.

And how I detested his driving 
from Point A to Point B nonstop
with my tiny bladder, and yet 
these days on road trips
I’ll pass a rest area, just because.

And the magic he could conjure
in the middle of a nor’easter
transforming our daughter’s 
entire bedroom into a fort, 
every blanket strung from bed post 
to dresser to desk, anchored 
with the dictionary, stacks 
of National Geographic and a trophy.

The two of them burrowed deep 
in the dark, with a flashlight 
and Where the Wild Things Are.
And how they’d order-in grilled cheese,
unwilling to crawl out for lunch 
and risk everything crashing down.