COMMON GROUND

The Daydreamer is gone. The one whose head was always swirling somewhere else and never there. The one who never went with them to the shore. The one who worked in ways no one quite understood. Now the other two stand among stones, holding flowers for the friend watching them. This is what we do. This is what we’ve always done. When someone leaves, we gather. We bring what’s beautiful. We stand in fog and silence because words were never the point. The candles flicker. The graves hold everyone eventually. Different paths led here. Different paths will lead away. But for this moment, grief is the common ground—the only ground that holds everyone equally. We all lose each other. That is the purpose of nature. And then we stand where they fell and remember they were here.