Today is black Friday, the 7th anniversary of my first child's death. I almost didn't remember it. I woke up and it seemed like any other day. The only thing amiss was feeling unordinarily concerned for my son's safety. I kept hoping nothing would happen that would take his life. Images of car wrecks or crazed school yard shooters flickered through my mind. Why? I couldn't grasp it. Was it a warning? No. It was a memory.
Someone I loved, a child of mine, died a very gruesome, violent death seven years ago. It is in there, in my heart and mind, even when I forget to remember.
I am thinking of who that child must have been and what s/he must have looked like, sounded like, smelled like... the whole package. I wish I could remember my life without this stone. I forget who I was; I only know me without Tennessee.
I struggled to get through that pregnancy, but other than that, I never got to love my child. I gave up. I cried uncle. I never got to love Tennessee.
I'm not allowed to love my child.
The "pro-life" movement says
I can only feel guilty and then set free.
The "pro-choice" movement says
I can only feel liberated.
Death says
I can only feel useless.
Today I spin. Termination throws a belt in the machine of adoration. Gears spin and spin with no where to go.
Spin, spin, spin...
the unhappiness
of life without you
of days that remember
your black passing.
forever
is what it all means
when there's only
the vacuum
of now.
