I may seem callous in the face of death. Like it doesn’t touch me or effect me. And, in many ways, it doesn’t. Because I don’t think of death as a finality.
It is, instead, an inflection point. A transition from one state to another. And for the soul, the beginning of its next journey. From this life to the next. I know this. Blood and bone. It is not belief. Or hope. Or faith. It simply is. And because of that I don’t view death the same way.
But still I mourn. Not for those I love who slip beyond the veil to that next journey. No. I mourn for all of us still left here. Bereft of this person we love. Forced to endure without the beacon of their soul. Lost on these treacherous and hollow shores.
I mourn for us.
But I also am cheered. Whatever pain and hardship this life had offered are gone. And whatever joy and love it offered is carried forth. As they embark on the next journey. May they carry us well. Knowing eternally, they were loved. And they will be missed.
grief
An anniversary I would love to forget
I’m coming up on 16 years since I lost Morgan. It feels odd to no longer feel the sharp pain of her loss and yet to still feel the dull empty of absence.
The last 2 years I haven’t even realized why I was feeling depressed until it smacked me in the face and I let out a soft ‘oh’.
I’ve grown around and beyond the pain of losing her but it never goes away. I know that for some it does and those people feel like aliens to me. I can’t understand how they can look back on everything and just remember the happy.
Or all those loss tropes of you have one year then go out and find someone new. Doing a disservice to whoever you meet as well as yourself. If you aren’t ready, aren’t at least healing, then doing that isn’t what is needed.
As if grief is something you can change by shear force of will.
No one asks the person with a shattered spine to run marathons in a year. Yet with grief and other emotional and mental damage we are asked to shed those bonds. As if we aren’t human. As if our humanity has to be put on hold so that society who was only tangentially effected, can move on.
Well, fuck that.
But also, fuck this horrible empty.
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Waking in silence to an empty house
Broken branches scatter
Wind tossed leaves drift
The truth is all that matters
In the heart of the abyss
A fallen plum is eaten
A fallen faith is born
One last day to remember
Again when all is worn
A last impression made
Upon the bloodied thorn
When last we met a whisper
Now all I have is storm
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A heart leads
I have never been a man who could not follow his heart. When I was younger that meant looking for the cracks in the world. It meant exploiting my talents and the talents of others for fun and profit. When I met Morgan, that started to change. I began to mold myself into a man she would be proud of. When she was ripped from me, my heart led me into darkness. Into silence. Because in the hushed darkness it was easier to heal. And, while externally, I became more harsh, more abrasive, more cutting; internally I became introspective. As I poured over and over the events of that night searching for any way, any possibility that this was a dream, a nightmare. And despite myself, I healed. And I met a man who led my heart out of that darkness. Who showed me it was OK to love again. OK to still be alive. He eventually left but I was awake and could not close myself again.
So I followed my heart. Again and again each time I was hurt. Each time I learned what humanity was. In my long absence, I had grown cold and distant. Until a year ago, when I finally forgave myself for not saving her. I forgave myself. But I must acknowledge that I failed My Morgan. And I will never fail a love again, if I can help it. If I know what is happening.
And I opened myself up, and I, in my naivety perhaps, thought I had found. But no, again and again, my heart leads me to people who are hurt and I try to help them. Because that is who I am now. Not the only thing, but it is one of the pillars. But I pay a price each time. I can love and love forever. And each person I love leaves or will only give so much before they pull back to safety. And so I am stripped bare. Cast adrift, seeing the bright lights of the people I love, twinkling from the shoreline. While I drift at sea, forever unable, seemingly, to make landfall.
Pelgris 