It was a morning of chilly air and the eerie silence

of August coming to an end.

I had just turned eighteen, I was leaving, and you kept frowning

at the green lake in front of us. My hands and legs had gone numb

because of the stone I’d forgotten we were still sitting on.

Time moves differently when you are afraid for someone else.

You said, “Antarctica is so far away no one will find me there.”

You pulled one of the reeds growing nearby, and it sliced your fingers.

The Antarctic midge lost its wings to keep from being blown away,

but it also can’t escape its birthplace.

By then my mom had already told me what J did to you,

and I couldn’t promise I would come looking for you if you ran.

You said, “If I go, my blood will freeze and stop moving. I’ll be just like ice.”

Your hand closed around the reed and crushed it.

When ice shifts along cracks the vibrations it creates

resemble singing.

I knew you couldn’t make a sound when he came to you at night.

“Antarctica will be an endless vacuum. No before, no shame, no nothing.”

The coldest place on Earth is where time stops the body.

I couldn’t stop you from going there even if it meant you forgot me, too.