Mourning Ritual - 2018

Mourning ritual, Morning ritual. I pause where your bed once was,

Where YOU once were,

In life and in death.

Did you see me? Then? Now? “How are you?” they ask. “I’m doing ok” is the lie I tell, Daily, sometimes hourly. I remember telling the doctor “Let him go”, after revival attempts. Lofty words, indeed. Let you go where? You were always here But not here,

Because you didn’t belong to us,

Nor us to you. The idea that we’re all on loan Pervades and escapes simultaneously. Lies are truths are perceptions are messy.

Remembrances of your joyfulness

Keep the shame of feeling joy at bay. Anger at the isolation of your life

Continues after your death. Did they care? Will they ever? Maybe not. Is that my business,

Or is the living of life my business? Why do we call it “business”? Busy-ness. Life for so long centered on a delicate bridge

Between keeping you alive 

And striving for a normalcy which evaded detection.

I rocked you the day before you died,

Sensing that you were leaving,

And not knowing when. There is no reassurance of schedule in death,

Just as there usually isn’t in life. Schedules kept you alive Kept us centered, kept us bound To each other, to the grogging on of daily life.

“He was here to teach” some say,

As if anyone knows why any of us exist. We simply are, isn’t that enough? Wishing you were who you weren’t.

Wanting you to not be as you were

Was useless. Lives lived in don’t-know Appeared frightening to the world

And comforting to us. Don’t-know meant reassurance- 

That “have to” was a farce Thrown onto those with expectations

Which differed from ours. “Survival” and frustration took the lead some days,

While joy and thankfulness led on others. Yet despite the don’t-know knowing,

The fear stayed. Were we right? Wrong? Good enough? Did it matter? It all matters, but not as the world would think. It’s not my job to know why,

Just to know “is”.

9:46 you arrived, 9:47 you left.

That is not a mistake.