pearl of grief
{for my husband most of all}
We were at the cemetery the other night. At this time of year, most everything feels like night. I like it like that. I like the melancholy and the chill, the dark and the buffered. I brought some beautiful music to play to the so-called dead. My husband lit a candle at the base of our daughter’s headstone and we stood leaning into each other, listening with all the souls under that sky vivid with stars, illuminated by a beautiful silver moon.
People will tell you that grief softens over time. This is true, it softens to the touch, but it is there as vivid and drenched as the day it was born, only the dimensions become more evident. It doesn’t remain condensed, it flares out and in. Breathing and pulsing, expanding and shrinking as it chooses. Sometimes it is unrecognizable, I hardly notice it’s there until it swallows all of everything around me and demands I return its gaze. Sometimes it feels warm and other times, its squeeze is too much. It has evolved from a flat, jagged weight into something multi-faceted with varying textures and smells. Sometimes it can be standing right next to me and it takes me awhile to notice. Other times I can feel its tenderness and gentle gifts in the rhythms of our world. Sometimes it throws itself around me and robs me of my air. Then in other moments, if I remain still enough, I might even confuse its embrace with love. Maybe, I think now, that’s not confusion at all. Maybe that’s what’s real.
I am learning. What else is there to do in this place - the after of our lives? My