the fields of bodies have grown since i was last here, the older mounds slumping into the earth in the quiet, final giving up to gravity and other forces, the slow folding that is universal (rotting trees, abandoned buildings), marked by plastic bouquets tipped with dew. the newer griefs are marching down the field now, in their ones and twos, followed by fresh flowers and raw tatters of soil. melbourne is hooded by grey cloud, a sombre prelude to the joy of rain.
i can't believe he's dead, the same way i can't believe in god or in the existence of sudan. i know he lies beneath my feet, i know this, but i do not know it, and i will not know it until it is my turn.
it seems like right now is a time of death; a number of my friends have recently lost someone dear, someone known and constant and loved. their griefs are fresh and raw. i can see it written in lines on their faces, in the way they look stretched.
my grief is older and calmer, more sedate. i never felt i grieved properly, kept longing to live in a place where ripping of clothing and smearing of mud on faces were methods of grieving, this baring, this rawness and exposing of our hidden true selves to the world. i wanted to keen in a pack, a group of we animals, one of those long, terrifying ululations you only hear in horror movies, a raising of voices in the eternal song of loss and refusal to submit. we did not keen. our clothes remained intact (sensible in times of adversity). we were civilised. we set the table for five for weeks until the strangeness of four settled in. we venerated his room. we shrank into ourselves. we cried sporadically and often alone and i did not cry at all (i tried), we were surrounded by friends who allowed us space and time and gave us warmth and casseroles and civility and civilisation and civilisation. we are healed now, i suppose. most (8/10? 9/10?) marriages splinter after the death of a child; my parents remains strong, but we are lessened. we are all lessened.
i wonder if we had done it another way, if we had held ourselves to the void and peered in and rejected it utterly, if we would be more than survivors.
i can't believe he's dead, the same way i can't believe in god or in the existence of sudan. i know he lies beneath my feet, i know this, but i do not know it, and i will not know it until it is my turn.
it seems like right now is a time of death; a number of my friends have recently lost someone dear, someone known and constant and loved. their griefs are fresh and raw. i can see it written in lines on their faces, in the way they look stretched.
my grief is older and calmer, more sedate. i never felt i grieved properly, kept longing to live in a place where ripping of clothing and smearing of mud on faces were methods of grieving, this baring, this rawness and exposing of our hidden true selves to the world. i wanted to keen in a pack, a group of we animals, one of those long, terrifying ululations you only hear in horror movies, a raising of voices in the eternal song of loss and refusal to submit. we did not keen. our clothes remained intact (sensible in times of adversity). we were civilised. we set the table for five for weeks until the strangeness of four settled in. we venerated his room. we shrank into ourselves. we cried sporadically and often alone and i did not cry at all (i tried), we were surrounded by friends who allowed us space and time and gave us warmth and casseroles and civility and civilisation and civilisation. we are healed now, i suppose. most (8/10? 9/10?) marriages splinter after the death of a child; my parents remains strong, but we are lessened. we are all lessened.
i wonder if we had done it another way, if we had held ourselves to the void and peered in and rejected it utterly, if we would be more than survivors.
posted by Doug @ 6/23/2004 10:04:00 pm
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