A Part Of You Will Always Smell Like He Used To

You make time seem fluid
moments from the past braided with the present
like the old lover you let go
but kept the memories
of how he’d cook Sunday brunch
from a little diary he’d got from his grandma
and she from hers
that you couldn’t help but teach your children too.
And how the words he’d whisper
would always sounded so poetic,
that you reread every letter he ever wrote
and found the phrases they bore slipping into your casual conversation.
You’ve named every line on your palm in his language now
and have spots in the colours of his childhood home.
You’ve long since grown,
nuanced, multi-faceted,
there’s so much more to you now.
But a part of you will always smell like he used to
because it doesn’t know how not to
because for a long time, you smelled just like that too.