PARADOX OF DISTANCE

You’re so close to me

I can hear your measured breath

I can count the strands of your hair

I can even smell the exquisite smell of your body --

Only your body can emit. Unmistakable.

Yet you’re so far away, far away

You’re such as phantom

My subterfuge,

Elusive, evasive

You leave a sense of hope

And hopelessness

Enough to remind me

Of my mortality.

Your presence, I feel

But you’re distant.