I was telling you about the missing —

I was telling you about the missing —

not the city exactly, the smell

of the stairs in the building on that street,

the light at four in the afternoon —

and I needed the word.

Not homesick.

The one from the first language.

The real one.

It wasn't there.

Two seconds. Three.

The phone line between us.

You said it quietly —

just placed it in the sentence

like you were finishing your own thought,

not covering anything.

I laughed and said yes, that one,

and kept going.

But I stayed on the call longer,

moving through more words while I had them —

the word for late afternoon light,

the word for rain that hasn't fully arrived yet.

I have those.

I'm pretty sure I have those.