I do not grieve like they tell me to.  
There are no tidy goodbyes,  
no soft release.  

My grandparents live  
in the other house.  
The one untouched by time.  
Where I am still small,  
feet dangling off the couch,  
the scent of soup curling through rooms  
like the breath of something holy.  
They are smiling. Always smiling.  
The kind of smile that says,  
You are safe here.
And I believe it.  
Even now.

People say they are gone.  
But I can walk through that house  
with my eyes closed.  
I know each creak in the floorboards,  
each photo frame on the hallway wall,  
the way the light hits the kitchen tiles  
at 4 p.m. on Sundays.  

How can they be gone  
if I still feel their warmth  
when the sun folds over my back?  
If I still hear their voices  
in the quiet hum between heartbeats?

Death asks me to acknowledge it.  
To grant it a name, a seat at the table.  
But I won’t.  
Because to name it  
is to end them.  

And I can’t.  
I won’t.

They are still in that house
laughing softly in the next room,  
calling my name like it’s the only one that matters.  
And I am still running to them,  
arms outstretched,  
believing in forever  
the way only a child can.

Let the world keep spinning.  
Let the clocks forget them.  
But in me,  
they live without age,  
without ending.