When the living leave us
they sprout wings,
and from the chambers of our hearts
they depart,
leaving vacancies, amongst other things
to be filled
and explored.
When you live on the other side of the world, far away from your family, every time you see someone, you know it may be the last time you see him/her.
You know it, and yet, when it turns out to be true, it’s still so hard to believe.
Why do you do that?
Why do you ask me why?
As if there were meaning
to any of this.
My grandfather passed away earlier this week. You couldn’t have asked for a better way to go. He was 91 and, up until a month ago, he was still walking around, still driving, still eating with friends.
But, he was rapidly slowing down.
Realizing his situation, it seems that he decided he was ready to move on, and after making the final decision, with family around him, he sat in a chair and within two days he had passed on.
the night you died
you weren’t the only one
who went away
and never fully
returned
Despite seeing him last summer, I had really hoped to see him one more time because I wanted to him to meet his newest grandson, who bears his middle name.
I had hoped to, at least once, bring these two together, to have a picture of the two of them together like I have pictures of my grandfather with my other children. But what can you do.
The three poems above were written about others moments of loss that I’ve had and observed in my life. I’ve posted them here because they share a common theme, and also, in some ways, because they stand in contrast to my grandfather’s passing, which was really, in many ways, ideal. There won’t be any lingering traumas like there were for my grandmother when her second daughter passed away after a very nasty battle with breast cancer (poem three).