Grief

There's a wonderful poem by Robert Pinsky in a recent issue of The New York Review of Books.   I read it up in Maine this past weekend but it's stayed with me here in Philadelphia.  It's titled "Grief."  Here's the ending:

You can't say nobody ever really dies:
Of course they do: Lenny died. Mike died.

But the old thing is, the person still makes
A shape distinct and present in the mind
As an object in the hand. The presence
in the absence: it isn't comfort--it's grief.

The presence in the absence--that's what I felt so strongly being in the house in Maine.  It's grief but it's not necessarily sad.  Maybe, one day, it will be a comfort.