Words of Sorrow

I started on this poem in February and posted it here on my blog. It is about grief, mine mostly. It is very hard to lose a love one in the prime of life.

It is about grief, mine mostly. It is very hard to lose a love one in the prime of life.

One year ago today my lovely and loved daughter Eryn Jan passed away from pneumonia. It has been hard. And now with the pandemic raging around the worlds, so many have been lost. Each number is not just that a number but a person whose life and breath touched many. Take care, and know that you are loved.

The loss is great, almost too much for words.

A great jaded wound has been ripped into your soul.

Breathe in,

   slowly,

        breathe out,

breathe

Look,       see,            numbness,           tears,

              rendering of all thoughts

                                tear into your soul

wounds,         tears,     sobs,    hugs,

       breathe

turn,     slowly,   look,     see,

   breathe

Remember

the laugh,      twinkling chimes of merriment,

    the touch,     the smiles

Remember to breathe,

          remember to look,

   remember to see,

                       breathe

Touch that what was precious

   be gentle in sorrow, it is hard

Hard on your soul, hard on your friend, hard, just as hard

   yet different

Yell,    cry,      yell,      talk,    feel,     cry,     sob,

                      breathe

Negotiate a new day

   Negotiate your grief,

          promise anything for one more day

one more touch,  one more whisper of their love,

              it is all

   we have left.

Negotiate your peace, promise,

                  look in the eyes,

   touch your soul with your eyes

Where silence is a luxury,

     give it space,    touch

whisper,     tears,

             breathe

Peace,

               a ways off,

                           it comes oh so slowly, it comes

in solace, in pink, in red, white, greens of the flowers,

    the blue of the sky, it comes oh so slowly

Walk, slowly at first, everything is slow, thick like mud, cold, unreal,

a trick, oh they must be wrong

  with Love, breathe, cry, breathe, walk, sob, cry, hope

With tears acknowledge the inevitable, gone with out you,

  one last good buy, words of love, of care, of solace

    a hug, gone and no more

tears, oh so cold, so uninvited morning, night, so many spaces in between,

                        relentless,

    my heart heals with the passing of each saline drop,

  slowly, so slowly, breathe, sleep, rest, go slow, one more drop

one more tear, the tare, the rent, the whole, just a bit less,

  hidden in sorrow, hidden in the heart a healing place

for you to stay forever in my heart.

I love you always and I miss you always.  For ever, you mom.

For Eryn Jane Tremain 1984 – 2019

the basin – day 136

a mottled sky in grey – be kind, stay safe and be well.

today is a holiday here on the west coast. i should be sleeping yet the upstairs resident wears shoes in the bedrooms and is particularly loud on this holiday when headed off to work starting at 4ish. so, i get up and as soon as this person leaves, i headed down to the water to chill for a min or two.

i said something yesterday at this time when so awoken and at dinner time last night the constable came by to say that I shouldn’t. what i said was ‘ you woke me’ it is 5:30 am as i had been awoken by this sad souls tremendous thudding on the floor above my bedroom. i said it softly, in my home, on my side of a closed window, and it was heard. so, no more words to this sad soul. the constable said that the true reason for the visit was that i had said ‘hello’ on 3 previous occasions over the last month. hello has been tradational a word of welcome and an opportunity to engage another soul where i live and was raised. i suspect that this sad souls end goal is monterey from some such unnamed source as of yet. i suspect that i will be the such a source yet i will fight it.

i have always believed in fairness and logic. this is defying both and by being strong, such weakness try to shake the strength through meanness, pettiness, unkind and untrue actions. this has been my third such call by my neighbours. twice now because of hello, the other time it was just about a lie said and forwarded to an innocent.

this is about control and not about fairness. or rules, or kindness. what these sad souls don’t understand is that all of their pranks, rudeness, pettiness and nasty controlling behaviours are just a walk in the park. the bitch that bore me was way way worse. so i will prevail with kindness and perhaps one day i will get an apology.

yet, i don’t accept apologies. i have had thousands throughout my life time and it never changes anything. i have felt that ‘i’m sorry’ was a get out of jail free card, usually no remorse, no real change, just a few flat words that never takes away the grief, sorrow and contempt that was spewed before.

now to be fair, i have said ‘i’m sorry’ a lot of late. i am sorry that i was not able to be an instrument of change for my late daughter. i am sorry that i couldn’t reach through into her life to help more, yet she had to learn to help herself and she did try. to no avail in the end and i am so sorry that she is now gone. and there is nothing i can do to change this outcome. so i am sorry in grief and in loss. do you see what i mean on how these words of ‘i am sorry’ are hollow and are not an instrument of change.

if you are the aggressor, don’t say you are sorry for in these few words, there is no instrument of change. say instead, ‘ i will not repeat these negative actions’ is a far better response in my opinion. a place to begin to change.

change is not as hard as most make it out. take a deep breath and exhale slowly, move the first foot forward, and then follow with the other. that is all change takes, movement. select a direction, and move. breath all on it’s own is movement. don’t stop.

be kind, stay safe and be well. one day at a time.