"Grief and I for a Cup of Chai Every Night"

(Found this one-line writing prompt on Instagram during National Poetry Writing Month and wrote this piece.)

"Grief and I sit for a cup of chai every night". I tell her everything. I tell her about breaking down on the living room floor. I tell her about the girl I saw in the mirror, and how lonely she looked. I tell her about the moon - surrounded, but always alone. I tell her about the making and breaking of homes. I tell her about growing older and wanting to and not wanting to. I tell her about how I run till I pass her along the way, so she can never catch up. She invites me in anyway. Grief whispers in my ear; she tells me she loves me as soon as I enter. “And I have fallen in love with loss,” I say. But she tells me she won’t ever leave. She’s waiting with open arms for every time I fall, so she can hold me at my worst. 2 am breakdowns and sad sips of wine and crying for no reason and running and running till I can’t feel my legs anymore and weak homes and shit friends and lovers so good it hurts and bad blood and punching pillows and birthing blackholes for all the people I love.

Grief only nods. Grief, she...she knows. She knows it all. So tonight, when it was just me and her and a cup of chai, she told me that pain is a kiss that lasts forever and grief is a prayer for the best and worst of times and that I will always be hers and she will always be mine. She gives me a friendship bracelet before I leave, puts it on so lovingly; I’ve started to believe in forevers again. “Come back soon”, she says, as mothers often do. “My favourite daughter...my door’s always open for you.”