The last turned apple in your hands, the last muttered apology, the last aggression;

The last baguette smeared with cheese, the last beady eyed bird on the fence, the last bug squished;

The last call home, the last cough, the last conundrum;

The last ditch, the last dog, the last dark night;

The last email answered, the last emergency, the last election;

The last friend lost, the last fight waged, the last fuck you;

The last giggle, the last groan, the last goodbye;

The last hill climbed, the last humiliation, the last home found;

The last itch, the last ink stain, the last I, I, I;

The last jingle, the last jealousy, the last jar with difficulty opened;

The last kiss, the last kite caught in the wires, the last killjoy;

The last lilac thrown against the door, the last lick of love, the last red lipstick worn down to the nub;

The last measurement recorded, the last mother lost in a crowd, the last hunter’s moon;

The last nippy morning, the last nickel lost never to be found, the last emphatic no;

The last onion to make me cry, the last oh my god, the last offertory to god;

The last pinprick of the skin, the last piece of pie, the last purse I never wanted;

The last god-dammed questionnaire, the last quarrel I’ll never win, the last quandary unresolved;

The last failed rescue, the last red breasted robin in the grass, the last rowboat idling on the lake;

The last stiff-upper lip, the last storage unit emptied, the last still-life stuffed in the attic;

The last tomato left on the vine, the last overgrown toe-nail, the last tattoo I imagined but never got;

The last U-turn poorly done, the last ugly duckling, the last terrible urgency;

The last valentine, never received, the last va-va-va-voom, the last vulgarity suffered;

The last wish for better things, the last whisper in your ear, the last wilderness of desire;

The last x checked off the list, the last x-woman fantasy, the last x marks the spot;

The last year of life, the last yawn stifled, the last yes said against your will;

The last zipper busted, broken, and beyond repair.

___

Marcia Aldrich is the author of the free memoir Girl Rearing, published by W.W. Norton, and of Companion to an Untold Story, which won the AWP Award in Creative Nonfiction. She is the editor of Waveform: Twenty-First-Century Essays by Women, published by the University of Georgia Press. Her chapbook EDGE was published by New Michigan Press. Studio of the Voice was published by Wandering Aengus Press. Her essays have been included in The Best American Essays.

Artwork by Meera Lee Patel