Saying Goodbye

Reeling from a phone call from the medical examiner. On vacation, fully unaware that my brother had passed.

From a heart full to heart ache with one phone call. And so I turned to poetry to help me process, the words falling out of me in a calming cadence:

‘I See The Moon Reflected In You’

To My Brother

Memories of childhood
weave in and out of the present
chronology non-existent
until I can’t quite distinguish
what is now
and what was then
as I try to fall back asleep
at 2:00 am

I keep playing and replaying
the last time you came over
to celebrate our birthdays
only a month or so ago
and how something you did
made me so angry
that I couldn’t wait
until you left

And how it took a month
for me to forgive you
but my forgiveness
was too late

How I should have
reached out to you more
hugged you more

And let you know
how much
you were loved

Words keeping me up at night gush onto the pages of my journal as grief comes in waves. This one is tough, and perhaps the family skeletons I share below are ones you’d rather scroll past. But, if your family has baggage too, then I hope my words help you know you’re not alone.

‘Through Darkness Comes Light’

I Hate

I hate
that you were never loved
the way you deserved to be loved

That your mother
chose death
when she should have been
holding your hand
on the way to pre-school

That our father
in the aftermath
of unspeakable tragedy
was told to ‘man up’
not give in to tenderness
and definitely
never
ever
talk
about mental illness

That my mother
only had enough love
for one
and that you
were never
the one

I hate
that we didn’t speak
when you walked away
with your pain
and that it was only when
everyone else was gone
that I finally understood

I hate
that you died alone
still yearning to be loved
the way you deserved to be loved

Art and Words: