I found a stash of your rose quartz hearts
in the top drawer of what had once
been my childhood dresser.

You, like me, a collector of stones,
perhaps using them in your healing work.
Me carrying cool talismans in my pockets

along with smooth pieces of shells and
heart-shaped coral from warm ocean beaches.
After you died, I poured all those hearts

onto my dining room table, imagined you
giving them to clients who came to what
had been my bedroom where you’d

have them lie on the massage table
and hold your hands over them,
offering the energy of the universe

to pass through you. I wonder now—
did any of that benevolence adhere to
the cracks in your broken heart?

Did those lovely pieces of quartz
help what needed healing in you?
And was it no accident that I found

your leftover hearts, opening my own
tender chakra as I palmed each one?
That the unconditional love I

sought for so long had been sitting
in my childhood bedroom for years,
waiting for me to find it?