My grief is different now. The ache transformed from a thousand knives and axes to the soreness of new skin. There are discoloured and shiny layers around my heart. My eyes seem to have a few more blurry areas and blind spots, but I can see. My heart beats and everyday something calls for my attention.
Two years I’ve been bringing pen to paper since I left for end of days. The ink records the changes like emptied tubes of ointments and garbage bins filled with discarded band-aid wrappers.
I can conjure the tears of missing and longing easily, but I have to summon them. They are not pressed against my eyes and face anymore. But everyday I want to speak with you women who got me started. And if I live to be 85 I’ll have more than half a life lived alone without those women guiding me.
Everyday something calls my attention and everyday the way I wring out a dish cloth or watch my cheeks fill out, I know my body has captured parts of them. The flower vase and the flour drawer. The lists and sharpened pencils. My desire to only speak to Milo with a gentleness he could fall into is her, my grandmother still alive in me.
Everyday something calls my attention. Milo’s weary eyes and no tick on the “after lunch nap chart” at school predicted our afternoon. Where at one point I scooped him up, carried his heavy self to the sofa and pulled the blanket around us. His tired tears and stories and pains spilled out onto my blouse and I pushed back his hair the way I remember my hair being pushed back. I do speak with my women everyday, with kindness now and not an ache. And when I suggested getting up to cook the noodles, Milo said “no, stay. I want to snuggle forever”. And we stayed. We watched the steam pour into the kitchen. We spoke of nothing and everything. And I did not cry for what I miss. I just smelled him, felt the warmth of small limbs, the sweat of his tired self, that makes his hair grow damp and musky and I spoke with my women and thanked them. There is a love in my every breath and that is not gone and has not changed.
I am speaking with you everyday and listening again and again to all you ever said.
Inspired by "Prayer" by Marie Howe