No platitudes for grief.
Of course nobody knows
the way you feel.
Others who have seen
their sons and daughters pass
beyond a last embrace—
even they cannot know.
Your ache and anger, your
questions questions questions
are customized, uniquely yours.
Flowers and cards and memorative notes
well-meant attempts to fill
an unfillable hollow, as one drop of water
cannot slake a desert thirst.
Tears coo to the soul,
splash the windows of recollection;
here, then, take my tears,
add them to your ocean,
condensing to a lake, a pool, a basin
for sun weary birds. When some day
all is vapor, and life again a dream,
he will smile where you will.
--4 June 2001, rev. 19 June 2022, Father’s Day
On this day, in 2001, my father lived. He was nearby, so his two daughters and
his son-in-law could celebrate with him. Mother, too, was there. They both passed early
in 2006, Daddy two days following Mama. The day Daddy died he lost his daughters,
and the daughters, their father. What is the difference between the different losses?
How many answers are there to that question? I know a part of me went with Mom and
Dad, and something of each parent stayed with me.
I see that in all my writing, loss is a featured character. In The Titus Gift, one of
my upcoming children’s books, Tommy and Erica fear their ailing father’s dying. They
live in a rural area, away from other children during the long summer. They must cope
with many changes without the distractions the school year provides. I might argue with
my own idea about how they thrive in their isolation and sense of impending loss, but
there it is, you see; I created the worlds each of them inhabits. Is it for me now to deny
the navigation of uncertainty that I provided? Absolutely not! Just as loss of my parents
initiated in me inevitable change, so Erica and Tommy follow a course that will change
them, probably forever.
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