You have never sat with perfect intimacy and watched one you love and have given yourself to die in your arms. Made all the worse by physical health the death of the mind, the heart, of light itself, fading slowly but undeniably out of eyes that you have bet your life on living, instead, dying, right in front of you, as you stare into them from inches away. The light fades, as you watch. You die too.
You have never fought to protect your little shrunken soul from a battering, from bricks and knives and weight, pressure so heavy you struggle to breath, forgetting its absence. You have never been scared of violence. Not really.
You have never prayed to God that you have always trusted for the life of your best friend only to watch him die slowly, with such pain. The body stays strong, but the soul, the man, he dies. You watch him, praying the whole time, terrified of what will happen, to him, to you. Absolute terror takes over and controls your life. Eventually you stop praying and succumb to the fear, listening as it tells you what steps to take and how to feel.
You have never walked with agonizingly slow steps away from a car with a yelling, screaming, raging man in it, still screaming through the closed doors, knowing that he was really just crying, a little crying boy, knowing that it would do no good to cradle his head in your lap, knowing the rage would prevent the tears and any healing found in them.
You have never heard him pray to God, in your car, after a fight, heard his weak voice asking for help, heard the precious tiny amount of hope, begging this unknown God to help him feel his love, a moment of truth, where he humbled himself and asked. This was early on, before. It did not happen again.
You have never held his head because it was so beautiful and you were seventeen, and ran your fingers through his thick hair, held his head three years later because it was beaten and bruised, unconscious, and told the doctors of what you found there, held his head because he was asleep and you were twenty-three and you had time to glory in every eyelash and the thin, olive skin, held his head because he was sad, and he needed your lap, needed you, held his head because he was throwing up all the pain he tried to swallow with port wine, knowing he would still wake up tomorrow with dead eyes and just as much pain as yesterday, held his head two years later, drunk again, making sure he was still alive, 3 am, getting in your car and going out to find him because of text message that woke you up, your love, alone in his room, two years later, twenty-seven, you weep but he doesn't know, you wait for him to fall asleep cradling his precious head in your hands.
You have never known real guilt. How it lasts, how it remains, how it cripples, how it haunts. It stains the very marrow of your soul, never to be cleansed, not really.
I don't wish that you had known these things, I just wish that I hadn't, either, or that I could find a way back to you again through these winding dark forests of separation. Then again, maybe you got lost on purpose? And who am I to change the way things are?
I didn't (still don't) know how to find you. I was lost.
Each of our pains and sorrows create a unique landscape of suffering in our minds and hearts. I don't mind it. I want to share it.
You have never fought to protect your little shrunken soul from a battering, from bricks and knives and weight, pressure so heavy you struggle to breath, forgetting its absence. You have never been scared of violence. Not really.
You have never prayed to God that you have always trusted for the life of your best friend only to watch him die slowly, with such pain. The body stays strong, but the soul, the man, he dies. You watch him, praying the whole time, terrified of what will happen, to him, to you. Absolute terror takes over and controls your life. Eventually you stop praying and succumb to the fear, listening as it tells you what steps to take and how to feel.
You have never walked with agonizingly slow steps away from a car with a yelling, screaming, raging man in it, still screaming through the closed doors, knowing that he was really just crying, a little crying boy, knowing that it would do no good to cradle his head in your lap, knowing the rage would prevent the tears and any healing found in them.
You have never heard him pray to God, in your car, after a fight, heard his weak voice asking for help, heard the precious tiny amount of hope, begging this unknown God to help him feel his love, a moment of truth, where he humbled himself and asked. This was early on, before. It did not happen again.
You have never held his head because it was so beautiful and you were seventeen, and ran your fingers through his thick hair, held his head three years later because it was beaten and bruised, unconscious, and told the doctors of what you found there, held his head because he was asleep and you were twenty-three and you had time to glory in every eyelash and the thin, olive skin, held his head because he was sad, and he needed your lap, needed you, held his head because he was throwing up all the pain he tried to swallow with port wine, knowing he would still wake up tomorrow with dead eyes and just as much pain as yesterday, held his head two years later, drunk again, making sure he was still alive, 3 am, getting in your car and going out to find him because of text message that woke you up, your love, alone in his room, two years later, twenty-seven, you weep but he doesn't know, you wait for him to fall asleep cradling his precious head in your hands.
You have never known real guilt. How it lasts, how it remains, how it cripples, how it haunts. It stains the very marrow of your soul, never to be cleansed, not really.
I don't wish that you had known these things, I just wish that I hadn't, either, or that I could find a way back to you again through these winding dark forests of separation. Then again, maybe you got lost on purpose? And who am I to change the way things are?
I didn't (still don't) know how to find you. I was lost.
Each of our pains and sorrows create a unique landscape of suffering in our minds and hearts. I don't mind it. I want to share it.
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