It hides in layers of normal life
It has to, to survive.
So much so that the more layers that pass, the more it seems to pass by with ease
(mistaking ‘forgetting’ as ‘ease’ // forgetting with more ease)
But my body remembers
When you were alive,
Our lives could pass obliviously by
Paralleled, unnoticed distance that crossed paths when they did.
In the years that have passed since – in the layers –
It sometimes, almost, feels like we’re again living in that
Oblivious parallel
But then my body remembers
Reminds me to remember.
I’ve often considered a date arbitrary
Meaningless manufacture
that we’ve created mostly as a way for us to make sense of time.
And yet somehow my body reminds me
each year, on the day,
of the heaviness I’ve been holding onto
since this day
Because of this day.
Does it remember because I
recognise the date and
allow myself to remember? Meaning
its always been there, it’s just
learnt to live
among the layers.
Death feels selfish
Because while it’s fundamentally about the person you lost
it since becomes about the people left behind –
our responses to that moment
when we stopped living in paralleled oblivious,
And the differing ways our bodies have
held that since.
Grief feels guilty
For getting lost in the layers and
mistaking ‘forgetting’ as ‘ease’ // forgetting with more ease
forgetting to be sad, sad
for getting on with your life
forgetting those who may not be
getting on with their lives
Guilty
for not knowing
how I’m supposed to grieve.
Feeling
Selfish
and unsure
if I’m still supposed to be.
If there’s one thing to be grateful for, for
Anniversaries
it’s the opportunity to remember.
As within the heaviness my body carries
there is
Perspective.
As among the spiral of guilt and of
sadness
There is pure, raw,
honest gratefulness
to have known you.
The Write Kinda Life 