I tell the little one, who is little no longer, “there is the ‘quiet’ and there is the ‘roar’, and in between is the living”
I gesture with my hands, I struggle with the words, because it’s just coming to me, this is what I’ve been feeling for so long, in that moment of telling her, the longing for the quiet, the staving off of the roar and the fourth thing, the thing I cannot bear, the thing I cannot face, but I do not tell her that, I do not dare: the end of all things, the inevitable, the inescapable, what underpins the preciousness of time, the forward momentum of each echo.
You want to write your way out of this and it’s impossible, you don’t have words for it, you don’t know how, you’re ill equipped. Let’s set aside that perhaps you are the cause of it. that it is all your fault because of everything you prided yourself on. You called it hubris. Indeed. You missed the signals, the warnings, ‘she doesn’t engage with the other children, she plays by herself’ and you wrote it off as her being shy, she’s just shy, we have history of that. You who was sat on the floor in kindergarten because you couldn’t shut up in class. You who always yearned to connect because you had no brothers, no sisters, no father. You didn’t have history of that, if anything it’s another addiction that you’ve tried to shed, another bad habit you try to avoid.
And you hear her weep and you wonder what pain you ignored in her short life, you think of that song, “the dreaming tree” and at some point, you won’t be able to protect her, at some point you will be in the ground with the dirt and the maggots and the worms. Or dust, or ash. Either way, you will be dead and will she suffer? You hound yourself, will she suffer? If there ever a time to believe in God and the afterlife, it is now and I cannot bring myself to it.
Between the quiet and the roar, there is the living and the absolutely certainty of the end
All things come from you. Through you, we have two wonderful and amazing children. Through you, we have learned to be caring and kind. Through you, we have learned selflessness and perseverance. This life, this ridiculous, little life of ours, full of laughter and seriousness, full of worry and seriousness, full of silliness and honesty. Every day I witness some nuance of how to be better, to be a better father, to be more than I ever thought I would be. So thank you. Thank you for being strong for them when I was weak, for being the soft hand when I only knew how to be the stern voice, for holding all of us together when we were tired and falling apart.
at some point, enough is enough and the goodbyes need to be said, the recriminations displayed, maybe not for all to see but to be laid out, this is why i was aggrieved and this is why you were not enough, to blow out the cobwebs that have become thorns, to wrestle past regret and animus and resentment. while he was never one for poetry, he was for words laying out treatises and guides and paths for others to follow
i will miss him, if only there will be one less person to share my rage with
how i long for the quiet, to be without a voice, to be here without being seen, without wanting to be seen, to be devoid of desire, to be voiceless, thoughtless, to only be the movement and the seeing and the hearing, to move through the world and have it wash over me, through me, as if i was the wind and leave no mark in it. to no longer hurt, or think about the hurt, or the hurt i’ve let left on everyone. i am tired of being the disappointment, i am tired of being disappointed, i am tried of feeling i’ve said too much, i’ve said too little, i should’ve said something, i should’ve said nothing at all. after this long road i’ve arrived at a place i never intended. i didn’t want to be this way. i just wanted to be near you, i wanted to watch you all. i wanted to hold you and laugh with you and cry with you. but instead this noise, this act, this spewing of bullshit that traps me into a configuration. into artifice.
dream child, sprite who twirled around our living room, quiet and pensive by the windowsill, grown into an urban hippy overflowing with a deep connection to the world that seems to shun her. Over and over, ‘I dreamt you’ what a thing to say to a child, the expectation, the hope, the confusion, what was I in this dream of yours? Do I measure up? Can I live in that dream, is it as harsh as the real one?
dream child, every hope before you, some yours but mostly made up of everybody else’s. is it hard on you, the anticipation of the false move? The meaning to say not quite aligning with the thing that was said. Is there remorse? Oh, my darling daughter, to already have remorse, what a terrible thing. It hurts when I think of it, I want to take it all away, the thorns hidden beneath the roses, the disappointment, the awkward pause that isolates you and drives you deeper into your mind
dream child, you always came to me. I remember. Sitting outside, smoking, you joined me on the porch, some chatter, some nonsense but a quiet settling, watching the world go by. Early mornings when you came down to the basement where I slept from a night’s worth of work in the dark. I could hear your bated breath, the glee, the anticipation, should I wake him? I don’t want to wake him. I should wake him. I could literally hear it.
dream child, I lied to you. You are nothing like I dreamt of. The dream was an idea, a figment of a desire to protect something precious, some manifestation of the love I share with you mother. But you are so much more. There are figures of art that when you look at them, they make your soul sing, they make your soul weep. Like looking at the sky when away from the city, an infinite darkness with a million pinpoints of something terrifyingly far and away.
And that is what I feel when I now look at you. An infinite sky, something beautiful and endless, but instead of silence, instead of an immutable distance, there is a voice that calls to me, that always beckons for me to join her, to join the pure wonder of who you are and becoming.
most of the time, in my dreams, i am resigned to all the horror and sadness. i’ve seen loved ones die. i’ve had teeth explode out of my mouth. i’ve seen you and them all leave me over and over, angry with me, overjoyed, not thinking of me at all. and each time, i am unaffected, an odd observer to my own life. it is what it is. it was always meant to be this way. null and void to the core.
today, this morning, in the midst of such a dream, of our mortality, i couldn’t stop weeping, sobbing, i was inconsolable, i couldn’t be held, balled up into myself, heaving, overwhelmed.
and i woke up.
not a tear, just an immense emptiness. the memory of the dream so vivid but not one tear on my face. i felt nothing, passionless, weightless, i was nothing. where did it come from?
it’s been all amuck. i’ve been all amuck. we’ve built a foundation that has begun to take root. i see a path out of the woods, i see the shore. i see the waves breaking against the jetty, i hear the promise of an end in the tide. i see the seagulls coasting the sky like kites waiting for me to take hold.
and as we approach, the soil turns sandy and our feet slip, footfalls momentarily stuck and slide. and this is where we are at, so close but it feels infinitely harder. this is the shortest stretch but the most arduous.
and of all the things i promised you in this love-life of ours, this is the one dream i have my sights on, the one thing that all this effort has been geared towards. and it’s crystalizing before us, it’s as clear as the horizon in the distance and the sea that kisses it with the sun.
will you join me my love? will you dance with me through this hurdle of dunes and petrified wood? will you sit with me in the sand and let the breeze play with your hair? will you laugh with me as we remember when our children were scouting for seashells? will you hold my hand as we watch the sunset before the moon enshrouds us all?
it’s just a little bit further. it’s right there, past the muck.
the machine moves, it has momentum. the only friction, could i have done more? it is never enough, it never ends. yes, it becomes background noise, the taunts of incompleteness, of being broken, a hobble of a man, no, not a man. there is nothing gendered about this, strictly shuffling, before the designation, before the naming, it happened all before you were even named: a still birth that crawls about and pushes on, scarred and scarring, unforgiving in your pursuit, unforgiven for what you have done
I saw the snow and I was filled with wonder. I saw the snow and it was falling, thick, puffy pieces finding their way gently to the ground. Finding lost brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles and cousins. Look they’re getting together, they’re getting ready to party. I saw the snow blanket the street, the car at the curb, the lawn, the driveway, the car in the driveway, the steps to the porch, a blanket across the porch. I saw the snow falling and how it covered everything and it was pure and white and lovely and a quiet understanding that this was just for me, maybe, if we were good, it would last a little longer for all of us. I saw the snow and remembered you in it, I remember you bursting with laughter, missing front teeth, so many years missing those two front teeth. And between then and now the teeth have come in, the smile just as charming, even more so. Making snow angels, a joyous glee, a sense of utter reckless joy. Which I saw from the window, wishing you were next to me, watching it fall.
ioanna,
The year ends, the year wraps up, we look over our shoulders and wonder where did it all go. What did we do, who did we dance with, where were the edges, what have we seen? The year ends, it wraps itself around us, gentle collage, vivid bright hues, warm sunlight, moonlit shade, the trace of a song whose hook is on the edge of our tongues. A deep yearning, a resolution, an accounting of promises. The year ends, we look over our shoulders, we gage its momentum, what will carry us forward, what got us here, what have we left behind? New habits, bad habits, new routines, new footsteps. We remember, this is how you walk, one foot in front of another. The year ends, wraps around our shoulders, comforts us, pours us hot coco and asks us if we want marshmallows. Who says no to marshmallows, no one says no to marshmallows. The comfort of the past, warm mug cupped in our hands, cuddled together, we look ahead. We look under the tree, just right there, to see what the present will bring us.
my love,
My love my love my love my love me love my love my love my love who I cannot complete my love I that I could not imagine my love I dreamt and wept and suddenly found by happenstance my love where we cuddled in the cold where we lazily bared with the heat my love we’ve walked miles and miles together through concrete through mountains through snow banks through bitter winds through sudden rainstorms that we laughed at my love there can never be enough christmases there can never be enough presents there can never be enough lights or ornaments or wreaths or mistletoe my love there can be never be enough of my love there can never be enough of the little ones tearing through gift wrapping papers and the utter joyous destruction of passionate children born of my love my love my love my love my love my love my love my love my love
