Category Archives: Grief

To grieve is an honor

I understand that the skin is a permeable membrane, and the solubility of pain correlates directly with the immensity of love,

Like swallowing lead and absorbing it and your body multiplying it, creating more.

The reactivity restraining your lungs, and after how long the body tried to save, the betraying, sudden, inner decay,

To grieve is an honor, the ultimate and final, ongoing act of love towards a person. The pain is merely a nuisance, a collateral feeling, the side effect of love.

Spiritual meaning of Blue Jays – Protection, resilience

Blue Jay Artwork by Krista Eaton

I can only bring you flowers

Underneath these clouds, the roses must be soaking wet. They were fine and lively, when I put them beside your name,

And the idea of cemeteries, how impersonal a place, after you lived your whole life at home,

But I understand why we adorn, and why all the flowers, as if to say ‘I know that you left me but I am not leaving you’,

I stand here staring empty at a silent tomb, trying to hold my heart in place, heavy and heaving with confusion,

And the only thing I can think of is how I used to bring you cake, and now I can only bring you flowers to your grave.

The Grieving House

From an outsiders perspective it might seem like it was left in ruins, with the grey walls and the windowless hall. But they would not know of the magic that surrounds it, all the tales of a feathery future too far gone for us to hold on to.

They would not know of all the love that was poured into its foundations, of the plans and the life we were going to build there. They would not understand the absolute act of kindness and kinship those walls witnessed. They would not know how much we tried to keep everything alive. To keep you alive.

Some days I feel your absence is bigger than I am. The sadness won’t let me make plans thinking I’m betraying you. You underestimated how much I would miss you, but I think you knew. 

What I think you didn’t know was how much of an impostor I felt, and how the guilt of being undeserving ate me alive each day, each day I didn’t think I was worthy of all the love, all the sacrifice.

The people around don’t understand the all-encompassing agony and uselessness I feel every time I grasp everything that we lost, everything that will not be how we planned it, everything you worked so hard for and now won’t get to enjoy. This unfair reality has me thinking of ways I could give up my life too.

It seems the work of a spiteful greek god, to let someone who brought so much good to this world, go through such unspeakably shattering pain. I will never forgive nor forget the pain.

But through it all, I thank you for the smile you gave me every day. I know how much it hurt to say I love you, with the compromised air in your suffocated lungs, because despite our hope, we knew it was only another word for: goodbye, I have loved you, understand that, everything I did was out of love.

In Kahlil Gibran’s book, The Prophet, he speaks of gratitude and generosity in the most beautiful way, he says: “And you receivers – and you are all receivers – assume no weight of gratitude… Rather rise together with the giver on his gifts as on wings; For to be over mindful of your debt, is to doubt his generosity, who has the freehearted earth for mother, and god for father.”  

How many of us would ring to heaven every day to apologize? I would tell you how much I wish I could’ve read those lines before you died. Deep down I know I was never deserving of this kind of love, but I am eternally grateful that you thought I was. That you always saw me as all the bright things a daughter could be.

The vultures that came when you were dying haven’t left, feels like they’ve cut the cords in my throat. I wish they’d take out my eyes so I couldn’t see what they have done with your memory. All the pain they impose in your name, how they feed their fat ego until they are puking out rotten privilege, leaving the honest-hearted to starve. 

But the house you built isn’t in ruins, the only ruin inside of it is my heart. Despite my bereavement I give my word to the stars, that everything will be exactly as you pictured it. With all the love, and all the warmth. 

I still thank you every day for deeming me worthy of such generous love. I look forward to the days when I can remember you calm, when I can look back or find inside of me your abundantly loving heart. I promise to be happy even though now I only have the clouds in the sky. Keep moving forward, think big, as you always said, will forever be stuck in my heart.

I Chose to Write

The morbid daydream starts like this. I enter the house through the big cedar doors, feel the warmth coming from the inside as the windows let the sun in. I would walk through every room, looking up at the sky through the skylight on the hall, slide my hand through every giant wall. I turn left and I can picture what the kitchen would’ve looked like on a Sunday morning, I can hear the laughter, I can smell the pancakes. There you are, all of you, I picture you happy, I picture you calm.

It would all seem perfect, but the delusion wouldn’t last very long, I would be back to the windowless home, all alone. Without the possibility to ever turn back time, to all the promises and all the plans. I would feel the knives in my gut as I look at the space you designed for me with such care, such love, how now is so empty, how I regret that I’ll never be able to make it seem whole.

I would crawl to the bathroom, bend my head to the floor, ask for your forgiveness and thank you for all the love. I will always thank you for all the love. Now looking back everything seems so ethereal. It was too good to last or too good for us to make it work. I know I might not be worthy of going to heaven, but without you here I don’t have a home, I am made to feel so low. You would never need to worry about me anymore, you would never get to know.

The sharpness of the venerated object, how everything turns beatific when you need it that much. The only thing more precious to me than my own veins, my own life. I know every petal in me would gladly pour out of my skin, painting everything with color, bringing it to life. 

Every room would fill to the brims. For an instance it would all exist, I’d be able to grasp it all. The creaky wooden floors, the fire warming up every room. The beautiful view of the city through the trees. A family all gathered in. The full bar and the books, the fish swimming happily in their pond.

As the last petal drained from my body, I would no longer be in the cold empty floor, I would be in my bed, cozily falling asleep. No regrets, because this is the only way I could’ve brought everything back to life. The only way I could’ve felt it.

I’d be sure to wake up in the next life, the one where we get to do everything right, the one where you don’t suffer, the one where I don’t ever lose you. We’ll get to do everything right, no worries, this was only a draft, a poorly executed sketch, we’ll do better next time. The light in my eyes losing focus, going down, but I can already hear the birds chirping on the other side, everything is blurry, but it’s fine.

A Daughter’s Grief

I can picture you now, flying busy with your various angel activities, I hope that whenever you look down you don’t remember the pain

I never could believe in heaven until you died, now I’m convinced there must be a place where all the good souls go to rest. I see you in the clouds, in every beautiful sunset, in the birdsong through the woods, every good deed on earth has your name on it, and I can only hope to be as honorable, generous, loving and kind as you were, as we all remember you

I hope in some way you can’t see what’s happening down here on earth with all of us, I wouldn’t ever want you to feel disappointed, betrayed. I know how much you trusted in the good in people, and I know how much people loved to take advantage of that 

I hope you got to the lake of your dreams, with your magic fishing rod, your magic cap and your magic heart, I hope you get to experience every beautiful thing you wanted to but didn’t get the time, I need to believe that you will, and that you are, still. Sometimes it doesn’t seem fair that I get to be happy, that I have plans, that I have youth, that I waste it…

I can’t escape the feeling that something has gone so irrevocably wrong. That we have all messed up, that we deserve all the guilt and to never be rid of the grief because the most special person has left us, when there was still so much love to give, so much laughter to share, so many stories that I’ll never be able to tell you about

It feels like nothing good will or should ever happen again, now that the special flame of life has gone out, I am conditioned to live in the cold, damp dark

I will always be thankful for all the days we spent together, I have enormous love and gratitude for the little things, for the times you were not alone, for all the monumentally special and uneventful moments we got to share, for every cup of tea, every slice of cake

You built me a heaven on earth, nothing will ever be able to compare with the love, the sacrifice, the compassion, and the wit that ran through your veins

Rest easy, my dad, my hero, I carry you deep within me, I am proud of you and amazed by you and will always be a student of your life