Writing my grief

— I —

Rosanne

I know that you love me I see it in your eyes.
One more day of not-death.
Mind aware, alert, awake,
Slipping slowly away.
Death as it unfolds.

I don’t really want to remember.
When we first met, first kissed.
How I feared you would leave me;
My heart was filled with gratitude
When you did not.
I don’t really want to remember
Autumn leaves,
Drum circles,
Gold and black and green and pink and red and yellow and blue beads.
But I do.

Serve the needs of my body
With love and tenderness.
How thankful I am
You stand by me until Death,
This Exit I so I long for.
I know your love in my bones,
The shape you take in my heart.

— II —

Path

Dark places I walk
In the Late Autumn Leaves
A wintry feel to the atmosphere
Around and within,
Sap chilled,
Dormant.

The road that stretches out,
Dark, obscure
I am ready to leave
With a backpack,
A few twigs,
For Love.

Memories are scattered, dry twigs
A few twigs.
Things are simple.
There is love in this place.
I feel it in my heart

When one dies and crosses into the Underworld
In ashes, black and blue
Without the one
To shun it and
Run from it,
Doing what is to be done.

My blessing to you,
I know you walk here too,
I walk with you on that road
So you do not walk alone

I light two candles,
I place a bowl of water on my table,
Before me.
We may feel
We never again will be Home.

— III —-

Mirror

Who is this man?
I looked to the face in the mirror
Glassy eyed
Grim line of mouth,
Hardness, of course,
Hard to get to know,
Hard to fool.

Yet tender flesh of my life as a body, a human.
Mnemosyne, the spring of memory.
The mirror holds no future
I cannot see myself blink.
The barb is not memory,
Or agonizing holes of forgetfulness.

Science, and the soul, poetry
An emptiness that dwells in the shell.
Dark, deep, mysterious
My life is small now, circumscribed.
No terror too small to hurt me.
I feel that things befall me.
Will I remember?
Will I forget?

— IV —

Sense

Only in sadness and rage do I sense life’s impulses.
I do not see, I feel,
A rudimentary, direct sensing.
A stone,
Old, older than this planet.
Not soft, unforgiving and unyielding.

Tendrils extend,
Lurking within,
Waiting to reach out,
To touch the barb
In the heartwood,

Dripping wet now
Drink from the river Lethe;
Forget all the pains and terrors.
Bacchus and Morticia play.

An ending of circumstance,
Simple pared down,
The empty room,
An empty heart,
No face in my hands.
The red couch supports
This strange frame
That houses a black hole.

Nothing seems to matter.
Attention withers, dithers and flits.
The knot clenches
Below the void in my chest.

— V —

God

From God, from my soul
A heritage, a patrimony, a gift of ages
One word that will be true.

God says:

Long ago.
Long ago in the past
Before your grandfathers
And great grandmothers were born,
This path was set before your feet
That you should walk it.

We suffer, we die.
Vulnerability is power.

—

I stood on the corner
Waiting for the light
A ray of light comes slanting
Down from heaven.

My soul says:

The path through death into life is there
I have to let His hard words fall on my head.

—

The past has come adrift in my life
There is no fixing it,
No making it whole again.
The tears, yes, the howls,
Until you can soothe me.

I cry:

Will spring come again?
Are the rains to come
From the river Lethe or
The springs of Mnemosyne?

God answers:

Feel my presence through my words.
The pure cold water
Just drink, drink and be refreshed

No death will come.
Take up your staff and walk the path
Full of bright things.

—

I feel alive,
As I should be.
I sit and think of blessings.
This is where I belonged
As familiar as Home.
My Savior stands there more alive
Than I have ever been.
Life, Life LIFE!