Tag: poetry

I’m all about the poems this week.

How Are You?

How are you?
How have you been?
Haven’t seen you since
Who knows when.

I want to hide
The silence stretches
Awkward
My breath hitches

Should I gloss over the truth?
What do I say?
Do you know Jason’s gone
And I am just surviving day to day?

Should I open myself more?
Share my fragile feelings-
Without my Love
I’m floating with no ceiling

Looking down on myself
Not recognizing my life
A stranger in my body
Am I still a wife?

But you probably don’t want to hear that
Just making small talk
Waiting..staring at me for an answer
Wondering why I balk.
 
And so my mouth opens
And the syllables I hear
The pat answer I give
“I’m hanging in there”

And you turn away
In satisfaction
And my heart is racing
From your innocent question

Deep breaths
You’re fine
Get through work
Glass of wine
My mantra
Time after time
On repeat
I’m fine

Lies

Empty Words

And someday time will heal the pain
I’ll look back and understand
Why this had to happen
In the bigger plan

That’s what people tell me
When they see my grief
And empty words fall out of mouths
To give themselves relief

Jason’s death does not make sense
Yesterday, tomorrow, or today
And telling me it somehow is best
Are hurtful words you shouldn’t say

Everything happens for a reason
Is another cruel lie
Falling from well-meaning lips
After I watched my Love die

It’s hard to see my sorrow
And not know what to say
But sometimes silence and a hug
Can go a long long way

My path is mine alone
One you can’t understand
So don’t try to give advice
Just sit and hold my hand

Yesterday marked 15 months without Jason. The same amount of time he battled glioblastoma before he died. So 30 months…2 and a half years…that life has been…I don’t even have the word. A struggle? A fight? Stressful? Fucked up? Unreal? Too real? Yes to all of that.

I woke up yesterday and just didn’t want to. Mornings are always difficult…the remembering again. Reaching a hand across the bed and finding dog fur instead of my husband. Yesterday, I just laid there and cried. I just didn’t want to…any of it…anymore. And then I reminded myself of a conversation I had with Seth a few weeks ago. Seth…who struggles so hard with his Dad being gone…and I think so often feels alone in his grief. I flat out told him that it is him and his brother and sister that keep me going…because I don’t feel like doing anything most of the time. And that it is loving them and wanting them to be happy so badly…that makes me get up everyday and keep my shit together. I think they were words he needed to hear…and that I needed to tell myself yesterday

So I got up and did the day…again…managed to hide my sadness…mostly.

Today is a rainy, gloomy Saturday. I told myself I was going to be motivated to do a bunch of house cleaning today. I did clean our room…including uncovering my desk from the pile of papers on top of it so my writing area is open again. That makes me happy. Other than that…yeah…it’s 4pm and I haven’t gotten dressed…and don’t remember the last time I showered. My hair tells me maybe Thursday…but could’ve been Wednesday. I just don’t really care. I did write a poem while I was dusting…

Dust

And as I wipe the dust from your urn
I yearn for the dust inside to reform
And you to return

Like a genie from a lamp in a tale
The caress of my hand a wish
You whole and hale

But magic left my life with your end
Wishes go unanswered
Into the wind

Our hopes, dreams, love, happiness
Reduced to memory
Ash and sadness

I don’t know how to live my life for the pleasure of living anymore…for myself…not our kids. I’m lonely, but most of the time don’t want to make plans. And if I do have plans there’s always a big part of me that is hoping they will fall through and I can just stay home. Those times when I am enjoying myself….like last Saturday in Eau Claire…I know that the instant I get home my mood will crash because Jason won’t be waiting there for me…ready to listen to me talk about my day. There’s a hollowness inside and a pressure building…all at the same time. Like I just want to scream at the top of my lungs…but would anyone hear me? Would anyone care? Pretty sure it would just get the dogs all wound up.

It’s impossibly difficult to go from sharing life so completely with someone…having your happiness…sadness…hopes…dreams…future…past…so entwined with each other–to this. I don’t know what to “do”. Instead of looking forward to retirement with Jason by my side…spending our glory years together…traveling…watching our kids and our grandkids–when I look to the future now I see…nothing. Every single dream had him in it. Honestly, I think once I retire I’ll buy a small cabin by some lake somewhere and spend my days watching the water lap the shore and my nights staring into a fire and listening to it crackle.

Hemingway once said, “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed”. I guess I had a lot of “bleeding” to do today.

Everything about this weekend was “unexpected”. Anna had been not feeling well since Wednesday. She called me Friday morning and sounded so miserable I decided to go to Eau Claire and bring her home for the weekend. I think she was nervous that she would be sick for two weeks like she was when she had covid a month ago…and didn’t want to be stuck at school…and maybe just needed some Mama TLC. I needed to see her and actually assess what she had going on…and if a visit to Urgent Care was in order.

I made her homemade chicken noodle soup on Friday…yes, I can cook sometimes… and her and I worked on a puzzle together. We decided that if she wasn’t feeling better on Saturday she would go to Urgent Care. Well, she woke up Saturday morning feeling better. In fact, her and I spent all afternoon outside getting ready for winter. Jason would have been proud of us for taking advantage of the “last nice weekend”. She took care of all of my pots and I dragged in all of my garden/yard decorations. We also got the garage cleaned out…again..so that Seth and I can both park in there. It was a super productive day. Then we watched a movie and played a game in the evening.

Today she helped me go through a pile of stuff in the basement before I drove her back to school. She still has an annoying cough…but I sent some cough medicine with her that was really helping.

It made me so sad to clean up my gazebo for the year. I feel like I was finally just starting to enjoy spending time in my yard. I’ll have to transition to spending time in the basement in front of the fireplace I guess. Not the same.

Have I turned any of you into Dermot Kennedy fans yet? Love him so much. So much emotion in his voice…and his lyrics…seriously…and when he plays piano or guitar…I’m just done.

I wrote this poem right around this time last year, but I was reminded of it today as I was driving home from dropping Anna off at school.

Fall

Fall
A season of intense beauty
And death.

Your fall
One last flash of all your beautiful colors
Before darkness.

Now we clean up the remains
And prepare our hearts and homes
For winter.

Spring
Is a promise of new beauty
Someday

Without you

Yesterday this quote popped up in my Facebook feed.

It resonated deeply with me. So tonight…when I should be sleeping, but sleep can be such a fickle bitch…I’m up trying to put my pain somewhere else…and for me that’s poetry.

Our Song

When the pain grows so big
It’s all I can feel
Time moves on but
Neglects to heal

I’m trying so hard
To find peace in this place
But tears keep on chasing
Each smile from my face

And as one year without you
Has come and gone
I feel more and more
Like I don’t belong

Our life was so beautiful
A symphony a song
We sang the melody
And the world played along

When my voice was weak
Yours was so strong
And as you forgot the words
I was there to lean on

Now I open my mouth
And nothing comes out
Our song has been silenced
Every note

And solo is so lonely
Every night alone
Not interested in a duet
Perfection’s come and gone

So as I wait for time to take me
I’ll hum our melody
And when we’re reunited
Our voices will sing free

Holy emotional week. I don’t even know where to start. Monday and Tuesday my emotions were just so raw and right at the surface. Every time someone asked about my weekend I just wanted to break down in tears. Luckily, I have some really good friends at work who really love me and are always there for me…even when I go into the locker room to grab the dirty towels and end up crying in there for 10 minutes. I usually am able to hold it together at work a lot better than that. I think the weekend just revealed a whole new level to my new reality. The unfairness of life sucks…a lot.

The change in weather is also making me think about Jason’s birthday coming up (Oct. 8) and the looming Holidays. Plus, I keep hearing Jason’s voice in my ear telling me all the stuff to do outside. If I had a nickel for every time he would say “we have to get out and (insert outside job here) because this could be the last nice weekend”. I’m not ready for the “last nice weekend”. I just finally got my gazebo set up and my siding done!

The siding finally got done on Tuesday. I still don’t have gutters or railings on my deck…and no estimated date for those. So frustrating. But I do LOVE the siding. I was worried about how it would look next to the brick, but I think it works. I went to Menards today and got teary picking out new house numbers. Couldn’t decide what to get and just feeling all emotional about “our house” becoming “my house”. Too much change too soon maybe. I don’t know.

With all my emotions feeling so “ragged” and work being stressful I decided to try to focus on a few “self-care” things this week. I made sure I got my workout in every morning…even when I didn’t really want to. My back has been bothering me so I gave in to the message therapist at work who has been trying to get me on his table for the past five years. I told him I would do 30 minutes and just for my back. It was painful…but really helped a lot. All of my stress seems to go right to my back and tightens my muscles up so bad I can’t even move. On Wednesday I got a long over-due haircut…it had been a year! I also got together with a couple friends and had a nice phone call with my sister.

Today I am trying to enjoy a Saturday with no plans….easier said than done. I honored Jason’s voice in my ear and pulled a whole bunch of weeds out of the corner of the yard. I told myself I only had to fill up the dumpster…a trick I learned from Jason’s sister…and then I could be done. Let me tell you…a lot of weeds fit in that dang dumpster. Now the dogs and I are outside and I am in the gazebo. Trying to stave off the loneliness. One of my finds in Alexandria last weekend was a tray I can use to carry out all my “gazebo essentials”….beverages, portable speaker, book, laptop, lighter just in case the button start on the fire doesn’t work. It’s great!

Loneliness

Loneliness is so
Loud
In my head

Even in a room full of people
It’s Power
Is overwhelming

I turn my music up-
Drown
Out it’s relentless battering

Try to feel some
Connection
To the world outside

Drain my glass
Again
To numb the pain

Try to make sense of the
World
Or maybe just myself

I was out running errands this morning and suddenly a poem was writing itself in my brain. It’s been awhile since that’s happened. Lately it’s just bits and pieces…nothing coming out whole. So when my plans for the day changed…and I ended up with the rest of the day to myself…I took advantage of the nice day and took my laptop out to my gazebo.

Your Voice

My ears still long to hear
And my heart just can’t let go
Of the words falling from your lips
Engraved forever on my soul.

I don’t remember the first I love you
But I can’t forget the last
Who would have guessed the time between
Would have gone so fast

From “Good morning Babe” each dawn
To “I love you” at days end
All the texts and calls inbetween
Sometimes just a heart and then press send

Our walks in the evenings
“How was your day”
Sharing our stresses-
Suddenly everything is okay

After a long week-
Friday night out with friends
I look in your eyes and they speak to me-
I know how the night will end

And when our heads would share one pillow
Our voices just a whisper
No one else exists
Just us- our dreams and future

And now the silence
It’s deafening
My emotions at war
Loneliness has me spiraling

I try to find some peace
Deep within my psyche
Music and poetry are my saviors
When nothing else gets me

It fills the silence in my head
Puts words to my pain
Keeps me company
Until I hear your voice again

Today is National Glioblastoma Awareness Day…I would love nothing more than to be frolicking through life blissfully unaware…instead I am all too aware of the devastating effects of this absolute monster of a cancer.

Another rough day today. Hanging on by a thread at work…choking back tears. Tried to focus on getting some more work in my yard done and ended up at my neighbor’s crying, chatting, and drinking on her deck.

Everything feels harder as the year mark approaches. I think I was hopeful that something would feel easier…that I would find something that helps ease the pain a little bit. Instead everything feels harder and I find myself drawing more and more into myself. I’m tired. Tired of hurting. Tired of feeling overwhelmed. Tired of feeling lonely. Tired of trying to figure out this shit life all by myself. Tired of feeling paranoid like everyone is peering at me from the outside…watching me…waiting for me to “move on” or “get better” so that I’m fun again and they don’t have to be afraid to say or do the wrong thing. Tired of masking my emotions…the whole “fake it til you make it”. Tired of feeling like a complete stranger to myself.

One Year

And my foot still drifts across the bed
Searching
When the alarm wakes me

A vast expanse of cold sheets
Emptiness
Your warm body gone

And I wish that I just wouldn’t wake
Drift
Go find you waiting in the clouds

And we could be Ree and Jas
Forever
How it was meant to be

But instead I am stuck here
Lonely
A stranger to myself

And my smile and laughter feel
Forced
No sparkle in my eyes

My existence overwhelmed by
Sadness
All consuming sadness

Head and heart so heavy
Fighting
Trying to find some sliver of hope

One year
Gone
Too many more

My Facebook memories have been hitting me right in the feels this week with pictures of our family vacation to Ruttgers on Bay Lake from last year. Those memories have me thinking a lot about “firsts” and “lasts”…sometimes you know they are important while they are happening…sometimes not. Some are milestones that we mark…almost religiously…first and last day of school for example…that are more developmental. Some are more life-altering…some become the moments that we measure our lives by…the ones deeply etched in our memories.

The summer of 2020 after Jason had his first surgery and chemo and radiation we rented a cabin on a lake Up North with Jeremy and Cheryl. I remember feeling so clearly that it might be our last family vacation that I put all sorts of expectations on it and pressure on myself to make it “perfect”. And of course, it wasn’t perfect. It was rainy. The fish wouldn’t bite. The kids were all a little “extra”…understandably so…they were trying to get a handle on reality as much as I was. I had myself so wrapped up in the idea of “last” that one night Jason and I were in the shower and I literally had a break down…ugly crying so hard I coudn’t stop…hyperventilating…sitting naked in the shower with my head between my knees…on the verge of throwing up or passing out or both. And all I could say to Jason was “What if this is the last? I can’t do this by myself” over and over. And Jason did what he always was able to do…talked me down…held me…put me back together.

And that horrible experience stuck with me so much that I vowed not to do that with the “lasts” anymore. Not too hold on so tight to expectations. To just let events unfold organically. Even when I KNEW they would be the lasts….because I did know. Our last anniversary. His last birthday. Last Thanksgiving…Christmas…Easter. And then our last family vacation last year. It was at the place that we had enjoyed as a family for so many years…and it was perfection.

As I have been reminiscing about our last perfect family vacation I have been thinking about other things that make me smile day-to-day…and I tried to write a poem that is maybe a little more uplifting…I’m trying.

Good in Life

When so much of life doesn’t make sense
Trying to get through moment to moment

Reminding myself of the good left in life

The things that make me smile
Laugh
Feel peace for a second
Give hope for a future
Somehow
Without you.

Anna
Seth
Levi
Pieces of you
Pieces of me
Mingled together
Perfectly.

Linc
Emmett
Crazy antics
Kisses on my face
Force me to face
Morning.

Birds in the backyard
Coffee
In hand
A pair of cardinals
Feed each other
Breakfast.

Family
Yours
Mine
Check on me
Don’t let me
Hide.

Friends
Acceptance
Make me laugh
But also
Let me
Cry.

Purple flowers
Blossom
Bring simple beauty
Color
To a gray
Life.

Perfect words
A lyric
A poem
Encapsulate emotion
Build
Community

Ease the unrelenting loneliness

Underneath it all is so much sadness
But, Babe, I’m trying.

Moment by moment.