kerf.

There is a measurement for

what the blade

takes.

the width of the cut itself,

the wood that becomes nothing,

that does not cling to either side

but simply ceases;

I’ve been measuring for years.

Tape out,

thumb on the tang,

marking the place where the thing I built

would have to come apart —

and I was careful,

so fucking careful,

checking it twice the way my father taught me,

the way every man who ever handed me a tool told me,

as if the problem was ever the measuring…

The saw doesn’t care what you marked.

It takes what it takes.

Somewhere between the line I drew

and the line I cut

there is a sliver of this that

belonged to both of us

and belongs to neither now —

not sawdust,

nowhere to be found,

just…

gone.

I have been trying to name it since

before the ink dried.

I have looked for it

in the half of the bookshelf that came with me,

in the side of the bed I still don’t sleep on,

in the version of her laugh I can almost remember

when I’m almost asleep —

it is not what you lose to the other person.

It is what the cutting takes:

The part that doesn’t survive the separation

no matter how clean the break,

no matter how long you stood there measuring.

I was precise.

I measured twice.

I still don’t know what I was before the blade.