the impossibility of regret

follow the narrow rain-coursings,
the leavetaking tracks of drops
that have fallen and rushing
run off, down, run away
from or toward bearings
unknown and unasked –
try to draw them back,
the wanderers, as if
they never escaping had not
dispersed with the best
of our bold intentions
that, you say,
is the impossibility of regret –
you cannot gather it back
to refill what has been spilled
but maybe this is why
the heart is migratory
and built for goodbye

© Sarah Whiteley