I did the work your nervous fingers
were afraid to do
I pulled the razor gently
over the turns in your face –
a landscape I have traced since birth –
I fill a wooden cigar box full of lasts
last laugh, last drive with you drumming the dash
last song deejayed in the kitchen with the broken cabinets
your skin – once baby soft – now covered
in blonde stubble, smothered in shaving cream
I pulled the razor down over the jawbone – widening
as the years stretched you towards manhood
last dirty sock strewn in the front hall, last homework assignment not yet done
last voicemail, last text
I pulled the razor down your trembling neck
Adam’s apple rising – not sure if it could trust me
last sticky bag of Swedish fish tossed just shy of your trash can
the last thing I said
I finished with the thin space
above your top lip
a space so intimately yours
I wondered even then
if this would be the last time
I touch you
Colleen Ovelman is an editor and poet, originally from West Chester, Pennsylvania, now living in Vermont. While much of her work and publications are focused on evidence-based medicine, her creative work has previously appeared in the Best of the Burlington Writer’s Workshop, the Grand Exit podcast, and in Vermont Stage’s Winter Tales. She is currently working on a collection of poems, a history of mending, which explores living with grief in the aftermath of her teenage son’s death.