I still bend for you

 I still bend for you…

without thinking,
without meaning to.

I drop food in the kitchen and instinctively look down,
expecting eager eyes and a wagging tail beside me.

I reach toward the floor before bed,
ready to scratch behind your ears one more time.

And every single time,
my heart has to relearn the same impossible truth.

You’re not there.

Grief hides inside muscle memory like that.

Inside routines love repeated so many times
that the body keeps doing them long after goodbye.

Sometimes I catch myself stepping carefully around the exact spot where you used to sleep.
Sometimes I still open doors slowly,
waiting for you to walk through first like you always did.

And honestly…
those moments undo me more than anything else.

Because they remind me how completely you were woven into my life.

Not as “just a dog.”
Not as a temporary chapter.

But as family.
As comfort.
As the soul who quietly shared my everyday world.

Still,
there’s something beautiful hidden inside those reflexes too.

Because every time I bend down searching for you,
it means love still lives here.

It means my heart loved you so deeply
that even absence couldn’t teach it to stop reaching.

So maybe one day the grief will soften a little more.

But I think part of me will always bend toward your memory —
toward the place where your warmth used to be.

And somehow…
I don’t mind carrying that love forever.