she is gentle on my mind, slipping in through the cracks. where the light can get in, so can she.
we coexist. she breathes with me. i do not notice her often, just in the moments where i’m trying to remember the shade of blue in his eyes or the way his white hair shone silver in the light. clinging to the love i’m sure we had. i made a pavlova by hand for him, my grandmother and i in a strange new kitchen, mixing endlessly. neither of us were owed his love but both of us held it until he left. i’m sure we still do, somewhere.
she likes to remind me of the depth i lost. of any chance at learning the creases in his face.
i mistranslate this feeling as anger until emily tells me i am carrying a lot of sadness, a lot of grief. i let myself go, release the tension in my shoulders and the constant prickling behind my eyes. bottle up and explode. I remind myself to be gentle and kind, and the anger slowly fades. he smiles proudly in my minds eye. i am not sure i should be using his image like this but everyone always says there’s no right way to grieve.
there are no answers on the internet, nothing i can tell myself to fill the hole in my chest. i started falling when i was not listed among his grandchildren and i still have not stopped. i was not invited to say goodbye. i was not with my family when the wound was open, and now i feel it is too far healed to ask anyone to sit with me while it slowly mends. it’s just me and her, sitting quietly at the edge of my memories.
the fire crackles. i reread birthday cards and notes left on the inside covers of books he gave me. ‘i thought you would enjoy this,’ he wrote. an act of knowing, year on year. i never felt the distance, but nobody knew that. i think they expected me to. she finds a bitter irony in that, leaving my mouth ringing with the taste of blood.
people who say it’s all in your head don’t know what it is to have it take over your physical body, not only your mind but your skull, bones, flesh and muscle. it all screams to be held, screams for his rough papery hands and an awkward hug, the goodbye i didn’t know would be my last. i would’ve held him longer, and she knows, she reminds me, she wants me to feel the ache i will never reconcile.
she is much like a father, but i don’t want to admit it. love seconds from my grasp. tantalus. the torture of a broken promise. the pain of knowing all i will never know.
but she’s gentle on my mind. softly kisses me goodnight and promises tomorrow she’ll be kinder, if that’s what i want, though wanting is an impossible game to win and we both know it. i invite her to stay longer. it hurts to keep the memory alive, but i cannot lose another second with him. they are more precious than i knew. more precious than my anger cared to see.
in my grief, i pick up the pieces and learn what it is to be again. to accept loss and treasure him regardless. the exact shade of blue in his eyes through the rear window, endlessly waving. the love embedded in soft pencil markings, in handwriting which rests with him.
she meets me where the light is and holds me until i fall asleep, wraps me in the peace of accepting all i will never know.