What I Kept For You

You leaned over and filled my glass

and I said thank you,

and I meant it, and I also

could not look at your face.

All night I kept my thumbnail

pressed into the stem—not hard enough

to break anything, just hard enough

to feel it.

Someone made a toast. I laughed

at the right moment, I think.

I've gotten good at that—

the laugh that lands, the eyes that stay soft.

The thing I know about you

is sitting in my chest like a swallowed stone

and it isn't mine to put down,

so I carry it home in the car

at midnight with the heat on too high,

and I lie in the dark

still holding my glass shape.