I cannot hear bicycle wheels turning.
I cannot hear gravel bounce off of concrete.
I cannot hear typewriters or good, old-fashioned quill pens scratching at paper.
I cannot hear punk rock or write poetry or read.
I cannot breathe.
That is, I cannot, without thinking of you.
What do you do when you know you are dying?
That is, what are you supposed to do when you know someone else is dying?
You have a death warrant, my darling.
And it could be any moment.
Every breath a cliffhanger.
Every heartbeat is music.

You see, you have put me in a bit of a pickle.
You raised me.
You taught me everything I know and everything that I live by.
“If someone hands you a paper, take a red pen and make it bleed.”
“There is always room for improvement.”
“Tell the truth until it hurts.”
“Do your research.”
“Question EVERYTHING, especially your own opinions.”
I can still remember you making dinner for the both of us when dad wasn’t home.
I can still remember walking in the woods out by 79 with you, picking up railroad spikes and interesting little treasures like rocks and flowers.
I remember walking around Cuivre River, picking up feathers as we walked so you could take them home and make pens out of them.
I remember learning everything from you.
Writing. Reading. How to deal with everything you and I dealt with.

The day I knew you knew you were dying was the first time in a long time you told me you loved me...Halloween night, sitting at the park on the swingsets talking about everything as we usually do. You blurted it out, almost as if those words were like wild rabbits springing from your black painted lips and you could not contain them.
You knew.
And now so do I.

You are my rock.
My common sense.
You are not afraid to literally knock some sense into me when I’m being stupid.
You are blunt and intelligent and you are not afraid to be disliked.
You’re sarcastic and mean and bipolar.
But when we’re walking around, people stop us and ask if I’m your daughter.
And for years, we’ve simply answered, “yes”.