Grief – 50 Shades of Gray Hair

Patch of Blue

The Eye of the Human Storm

Today’s forecast
Pain with a chance of happiness
Life
It hurts
Our first breath
Born in and out of
Pain
Our last breath
Born in and out of the fear of
Death
Beginning to end
The human struggle to keep moving
Beyond the current pain so we may
Endure the next
To begin again
The circle, the cycle
Of life, of pain
To reach our destination
Death
So
What is the point?
When one ends where one begins?
What is the point?
The middle
Is the point
To feel the heart beat
Of a lover
To hear the laughter
Of a child
To know the touch of another
The touch that completes
Our circle
Ones who will rejoice with us
And for us
And those who will mourn us
But more
Remember
That we were here
That we mattered
That we made the difference
That we closed a part of their own circle
And that they too
Closed a part of ours
To gather
At the end of the day
To hear the sounds of silence
The human sounds
We make without knowing
The sounds of love
And life
The middle
Those sounds our ears miss,
But that our hearts hear
These are the sounds of silence
So loud we are compelled to
Listen
Struggle to keep moving
From one pain to another
For in the end
It is not the pain
We Remember
It is
Love
Our circles have no true beginning
They meld
With our ending
We only have what is in
The middle
Today’s forecast
Pain with a chance of happiness
Take an umbrella if you must
Wear your raincoat
Wear galoshes if you have to
But
Prepare more for getting swept
Into the middle
‘Cause that’s where life happens
In the middle
Never be afraid to get wet
So
Put the fear aside
Go beyond the tropical storm of prologue
Fear not the hurricane of the epilogue
Walk into the wind
Get pummeled by the rain
Get to the eye
The middle
Where the calm allows us to hear
The human sounds of silence

The sounds of Love

For My Father

My First Love ~ My Only Hero

Part II – Opening a Window

today she wakes
and looks in the mirror
again
she notices first
that she is not alone
there, in the reflected layers of her life
a reunion of all who have walked with her
loved with her
laughed and cried with her
survived with her
leaving pieces of their own hearts, like beacons
along the path she now travels
softly focused, each smile touches her soul
some, instantly recognizable
familiar and loved faces of those who have made a difference in her life
how could she have forgotten?
others are strangers, unknown and unmet
but she hears them whisper…
“you have made a difference in ours”
how could she have known?
so many
she never realized
the power of one
but she feels its truth in the swelling of her heart
♥
she feels him there
she doesn’t have to seek him out
in every layer, his is the brightest light
drawing her back through each layer
back and back and back to their beginning
he shows her and whispers to her heart…
“this is how you’ll always be to me; this is how I’ll always be to you”
he takes her hand and moves forward
she sees the evolution of their lives
the birth of their greatest joy
great gains and greater losses
buds of youth giving way to blossoms of senescence
destined to fall from the tree of life
as all things must
closer and closer and closer
to this moment of here and now
he shows her and whispers to her heart…
“I am and always will be”
“You are and have always been”
“Nothing else matters”
“Nothing will ever change that”
♥
she turns, eyes bright with unshed tears
she sees
lines deep beside her smiling mouth
she knows
love’s power surging through her veins
she feels
whole
♥
then…
she opens the window

Part I – Knocking on the Door

today she wakes
and looks in the mirror
again
she notices first
the remnants of last night’s all too familiar routine
fully clothed still
with bruise colored footprints left where mascara met shadow
during the waltz of silent tears
evident again in the echo of wine and spit
that mixed and mingled in the dark
leaving traces of their orgy in the corners of her mouth
she raises a limb as heavy as any redwood branch
to touch the nest of bad dreams atop her head
she stares blankly at the woman before her
youth still lives here, but it wears an old coat
to look at the ghost of auburn that was once a crown
a flaming glory that framed her naturally pretty face
is now to look at a reminder
of yet another step further from who she was
another step closer to who she is becoming
where once there was silk and cream
her face is now but a road map
to anywhere but where she wants to be
no distinction can she find
between the sleep weary blouse
and those roads leading everywhere but back
she draws breath and holds it while she raises her gaze
could those eyes really be hers?
the once vivid seas of blue now faded and dull
surrounded by tributaries of red
brooks and streams of guilt, anguish, worry, pain, and sorrow
clouding the windows to her soul
where once there shined such joy and true passion
eyes that burned so bright, they lit the path to his heart
like no man made torch ever could
but
her passion lies miles away
alone, crooked, and silent
his windows too
mostly cloudy with a slight chance of sun
a chance she lives for
but the light thief will return
and she won’t be ready, can never be ready
for that one moment the thief becomes a murderer
the villain of darkness called dementia
her love waits, unknowingly, for that day
she waits with him, but she knows he’s coming
and it’s killing her

part II – Opening a Window

Good Grief

I’ve experienced my share of loss. Most of a certain age have, and some not of such an age. It is an inevitable part of life.

I’ve mourned the loss of grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and friends much too soon, neighbors, and four-legged buddies too.

Grief is a process. It’s as important a process as learning to walk or speak. It’s something we all must do in stages…there is no other way. We can deny it, run from it, gloss over it, or ignore it…makes no difference to grief. It says…

“Deal with me now or deal with me later…face me today or sit back and let me take over your life…I can and will, offer you the tools but you have to choose how or if to use them. For if you leave it to me, I’ll build walls with no windows and doorways to nowhere. I’ve got your heart in my hands and I can keep it in the dark and squeeze the life out of it. Or, you can help me release it back into the light. The choice is yours.”

Mourning has a natural path it must follow; a beginning, a middle, and in time, an end. We must allow ourselves to follow it to its natural end. And I say natural because we are all different. We didn’t all learn to walk and talk at the same point in our lives. We each learn as and when we are meant to. With help or without…we have but one choice if we are to become who we are meant to be. I don’t believe anyone is meant to be broken by grief. It’s a choice. A sad one, but still a choice.

In the past several months, I’ve been one of those denying, running, glossing over, ignoring souls. And not from the grief of losing ones I loved to dying. No. For me, that is the allowed grief, the necessary grief, the natural mourning after saying goodbye to their souls grief.

No, it’s the mourning the loss of life that still breathes; the blood’s still flowing but the heart’s not beating, life; the everyday life staring back at me in that shattered mirror life that I had to choose to either pour a new foundation, pick up the hammer, and start building a new frame for; or choose to let grief build me and my tender heart into box kind of grief that I ran from.

I didn’t understand. No one had died. Neither of us was ill. Grief? Mourning? I just didn’t get it.

Then.

Now I do.

I woke to a poem today.

Not a morning poem, but a mourning poem.

A poem of love lost, dreams gone, futures altered:

I close my eyes, see a life once shared
I close my eyes, sweet memories there
I close my eyes, our future’s gone
as is the past
Eyes now open and shed of tears
No longer sorrow, pain, and fear
Open eyes to a new journey
Toward lives of love for you and for me
My open eyes see friendship strong
and will ever last
Our years of love and care mean wishing
That each will find what we were missing
But one things sure and I hope you do see
You’re my best friend and always will be

This poem woke my giant who was not only sleeping but hiding under the Hoover Dam. It helped me acknowledge my need to mourn the loss of a once treasured and thought unbreakable bond of a decades long marriage. I was lost in sadness; mired in a self-pity; feeling guilty for wanting more; needing more; yet never admitting I needed to grieve what was gone, mourn that loss of the life we’d made and shared.

Yet, in those few words of a sleepless night’s reflection and melancholy remembrance of a life’s love shattered, there was hope. For each other. To find love and true happiness. For building a stronger bond of friendship beyond those days of “I don’t anymore” on through to these days of “I do and always will, and cannot imagine a life without you in it, somehow.”

To Hugh. The man I grew up with, fell in love with, married, bore children to, and said goodbye to as my husband…I say this:

the past does visit still when sleeping
the day will come for no more weeping
but, this mourning must travel its natural path
this grief we share of days gone past
of love and life and joys and sorrows
for lost dreams, hopes, tomorrows
and in its wake, will dawn a new day
together and separate we’ll each find our way
to fulfilled lives complete with laughter
to each grab hold of what we’re after
but this remains a constant truth…
life would not
could not
be…
without you, my best friend

Thank You. For helping me see what I would not.

Grief.

For pulling me out of hiding.

To Grieve.

For knowing I needed to.

Grieve.

And for loving me enough to say it.

Grief.

Good Grief.