GrassBlade of Trill

[ismo]

My plan for today was to energetically and efficiently work on preparations for the arrival of many guests, starting Thursday. There's a lot of cooking and cleaning to be done. However, my day was laid waste by waking up in the middle of the night and having a grief attack that kept me awake for two or three hours. So then I had to crawl back into bed, sleep late, and take a nap later. I wasn't very effective. A friend says we should call it AINTNUTTN, short for Awake In Night To Nurse Untold Tragically Torturous Notions. Then if anyone asks me what's wrong, I can just say it AINTNUTTN.

It snowed a little more last night, and the ground is still white, the sky gray and dreary. OH WINTER NO. I wish I knew how to quit you! I talked to my mother tonight, and she kept falling asleep in mid-conversation.

While I was up in the wee hours, I wrote a poem. It's not that great, but it served a purpose in setting the words outside my head so I could stop crying. Then I had to stay up awhile longer so my nose would unstuff to the point where I could breathe lying down. I'm going to put the poem in here in case it would be helpful to anyone else who is having these feelings. But if you're not already sad, and don't want to be sad, please don't read it, because it is pretty sad. Or so the Sparrowhawk tells me.

Moving Away

I’ve moved away so many times.
When you go, your body longs for its old place
Like a lost dog.
The old streets are ghosts in your head
Like phantom limbs
Always begging to become real once more,
Asking you to rise and walk, and turn the old corner and go home.
You want the grass on that one lot that was blessed by your children’s feet,
The dirt that crumbled in your hand where the tomato plants grew.
Phantom roses ask you to come to the back door,
Their frank sweetness pleading come back, we miss you.
No other dirt will do.

Last night I dreamed I had to go away.
We had to sell this house too, and part company.
I woke up crying no, no, no,
This is just a dream.
A grief so huge will break my house down
Coming through the door.
Last night I dreamed my mother wanted me to take her out for chicken.
I asked her where she wanted to go
And she named a place I never knew
Where they had red cherry almond honey sauce.
She was young again, with soft dark hair
Wanting fried chicken before I went away.
We passed a park and I saw a girl who could have been me.
Long braids flying, she called out in her game.
I walked faster. Don’t look back.

Last week I saw my mother in her bones.
Her house is gone to a few sticks leaning together.
All the sweet business of life
Silently oxidized away
As time licks the sweet red from an old barn.
What’s left but a few straws blown by the wind,
This house without beams or walls.

When you have to go away
Don’t look back.
Don’t look to see if the cherry tree still blooms,
If the roses are cut down.
Don’t look back
Or you will cry
And your body will turn toward home
Even in your sleep.

My mother’s body housed my flesh
And now I have no home there.
She is moving away.
I dreamed I had to sell my house,
I dreamed I lived in the space
Between the contract signed and the day the packing starts.
Even my own flesh, my last sweet house, must go.
So huge a grief breaks down my door.

And when I go away
Turn the key in the lock
One last time
And let your hand slip from the sun-warmed wood
And don’t look back
And don’t look back
When I have to go away.

Comments

[rosemarykirstein]

Like so many of your poems, this is just so beautiful. It did make me cry, but that's a refelction of its power. Sometimes you amaze me with your perceptions. I'm so glad you shared this.