the waves, the waves

conversations about grief

In the car, at the table, on the bed, in the sea, at the supermarket, in the shower, on the sand, in the stairwell, at my desk, on the ferry, everywhere ––– I imagine conversations about grief.

/

There was togetherness. I touched and was touched. I recognised faces. I held faces in my hand. I ran fingers over wool and fleece and denim all of those times I reached out for a shoulder or an arm to hold. I invited gestures. I huddled. We complained about Edinburgh’s weather. I ate jam made by a friend. I shared a plate with a group. We passed around nasi lemak. When the stage lights dimmed, I sobbed in her arms in the new darkness. And she held me. I laughed at my therapist’s joke. It was actually funny. The flowers made it through a six hour train journey. The card was earnest and I reread it three times. I cooked something for someone. Someone cooked something for me. I was caught on film. I hosted. I felt pleasure. I desired. I lied. I stood in a crowd. I was in relation.

/

still.

grief/grieving

to grieve

is

so

fucking

lonely.

/

The imaginary conversations I have in the car, the bath, the sea, etc., make me cry. It’s very strange ­­­­to cry ––– to leak ––– to spill ––– constantly and when alone. Do tears even matter if no one can see them. Is that not their evolutionary function. A watery sign. A signal for help. THIS IS UNBEARABLE. Did the tree fall if no one was there. Etc.

/

Sometimes I’m not alone. Sometimes I’m in the back of the classroom hiding my face in my hands while my colleague says something about sound being the last of our senses to go when we die.

/

The things we say/extract, reveal, teach, lecture, for the sake of the poem.

/

It’s ok in the sea. Water meets water. The waves are relentless. The waves are like my elliptical, roaring, churning grief.

/

walking into the ocean waves

/

The imaginary conversations exist in my head because I don’t talk to anyone about what hurts me. Not really or at least not often. This is not about privacy. Something to unpack later: why do I feel like my friendship is a burden? The last year is a tightly wound coil. An unsaid fragment that collects more and more tension. It’s still collecting tension. How long before a fragment begs for completion ––– closure?

My pain might exist in a poem, but in my poetry, it is real-not-real. Imagined. Figurative. Impressionistic. Crafted. A spectacle. Grief but not grief. My father but not my father.

/

The group chat unknowingly reminds me how long he has been gone. I feel faint the morning I read 50 days.

/

Everything I encounter is a grief aesthetic. I feel the slide of seaweed on my ankles. I look out at the horizon. Later, I push the paddle through the water. The still body of water looks like the flat prairies back home. I see its gently rippling expanse and imagine canola fields. It hurts to remember. Later still, my dark toes above the surface. A cold and momentary slip underneath. The waves, the waves, the waves.

/

There are phrases I will probably not say again. That I only said to him. That I only texted to him. My phone automatically fills/filled them in. How long before the learned diction disappears from technology’s memory? I didn’t realise there would be more lost languages to mourn in my lifetime.

/

On the doorstep, an envelope. TO THE OCCUPIER. Inside, a small book. It fits right in my coat pocket. It’s a book about hope. I think of all the hope and resistance and resilience and fight and reclamation that I put in my own books. I think of the price tag on those books. I think of selling hope and resistance and resilience and fight and reclamation and self. I think of selling grief. I recoil. I re-coil.

Yet, this book on my doorstep was anonymous and free. I am ready to be told about hope. I am begging for it.

/

The last thing I said is we’re all here. We love you. That was the last sound.

---