Brown Bird XXVIII
I had to talk to family today. I know they mean well, but still I skirted around what everyone wanted to talk about. I whispered through the castle walls, barely loud enough to let them know I hadn’t painted the ceiling red yet. Which, if we’re honest, is the unspoken question whenever anyone loses a partner. I was polite, and I didn’t give specifics. Told them, “No, I’ve just been enjoying being away from my phone.” Which is true, and not at the same time. I sat there on the phone staring at your bed, and was aware that I wasn’t in the conversation from the beginning. After a few minutes I just said, “Yeah, I’m thinking I’m just going to take another week away.” I thought I’d feel bad, thought I’d feel like a bad son, bad friend, or whatever—but I felt lighter, more free. These chains aren’t helping things, and if putting distance between them and I lightens the load—then distance is what I’m going to create.
Brown Bird XXVII
There’s still no air in my lungs, and all I can taste is the blood in my mouth.
Brown Bird XXVI
An old guy in the neighborhood asked me today how old you were. I tried to answer him. God I tired. All that came out was, “She died last week.” I couldn’t even look at him. It was me who felt it most, felt him trip and stumble into a place he didn’t belong. “She…uh…,” was all I muster after that. My voice cracked and I turned away from him, just waving a hand and beginning to walk away. He just stood there. I caught a nod in the corner of my eye through my hair, looking over my shoulder at the ground, and choking, I said, “Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude…but I can’t…” He was nice enough, “No, I get it,” he said. He definitively doesn’t. He doesn’t know detoxing with just you, he doesn’t know the job, he doesn’t know the partnership, he doesn’t know the storms, he doesn’t know the long nights on concrete, he doesn’t know the long nights in the car, he doesn’t know holding wounds shut with his hands trying to drive a manual at the same time and can’t see the road through the tears…he doesn’t know the anguish of going hungry to pay for doctor bills and your food because we could only afford two of the three—for years. If there was anything in the world he didn’t get…it was this—whatever this is. Who I was, has been ripped in two. It’s the same shit that everyone says, “give it time,” “it’ll get better.” People prove to me on a daily basis just how much they definitely, don’t fucking get it. Nothing pisses me off quiet so much as, “I get it.” I walked away without saying a word, I’m know it’s wasted breath. I walked away.
Brown Bird XXV
I know they can’t see you, but every time I look to my right, there you are.
Brown Bird XXIV
It was a dream. I had a small box, and I picked you up. You were so small. I curled you up gently in the bottom and cradled you out into the field. A field of soft clover stretched to the horizon. Soft and delicate on the feet. A wall of Black-Eyed Susans and Buttercup flowers stood knee high, tracing the clover’s edge. I stood there in the never-ending meadow, with my box, watching the wind caress the wildflowers. You walked up and sat next to me on the soft clover. You were bigger and healthier. The tumors and the grey were gone, as if they’d never been there to begin with. You took a deep breath, but not one of exhaustion; it was slow and smooth on the exhale. Content and comfortable, you stared off into the cascading hues of blues and purples of the setting sun. When I opened the box, it was empty, so I tossed it on the ground, and sat next to you. We sat until the sunset, breathing deeply, and feeling the wind on our skin.
Brown Bird XXIII
We saw the birds first. Except they weren’t birds, they were shattered branches and bundles of debris screaming across the sky. I cried out for you, and you ran fast and hard. The roaring sound of the approaching train chasing close behind us. We dove into the bathtub and slammed the door. In the pitch black, I held you close, trying to calm you as you shook violently, as the ground shook beneath us, as the walls flexed and bowed, threatening to give way. My heart raced, and my hands shook.
Brown Bird XXII
I’m trying. I’m trying to alchemize this transition. I’m trying to let these tools do their work. But I can barely hold the chisel, and the waves just keep crashing. One after the next, after the next. I’m choking on the salt water and sand. The sky’s turning purple and blue, and I’m trying not to struggle.
Brown Bird XXI
In so many ways, you were a mother watching over me.
In so many ways, I was just a child trying to listen.
Brown Bird XX
It’s 4:51 in the morning and I’m trying not to stare at the clock. I would go to sleep for no other reason than to make sure you got to see the sunset on our evening walks. I made sure to make sure I’d be awake for at least enough daylight for that. Then again, you were always more of a night owl. It’s easier to walk in the cool of the night. It’s quieter, less bugs in the shadows, fewer cars. It’s peaceful, it’s easier to feel the wind on the skin. It just never felt quiet so empty.
Brown Bird XIX
For the first time in four days, I got out of bed for more than a cigarette and a conversation with the wind in a garden. I needed food. Four days, even for someone like me who’s used to it, is a long time. And the neighbor was busy installing a new subwoofer, insisting on full volume testing—for what reason? I have no idea—maybe the rattling of panels on a beat up old ford focus still holds some socio-cultural value here. Either way it was enough to at least get me into the shower. The shower turned a color I hadn’t seen since my days in the infantry. I thought about a poem I’d read with some intent years ago after a similar dark time. It was a flow chart poem. It’s premise was the transitional choices a father made leading up to his son’s death. Morbid…I know…but at the time it was healing. The point is that the premise of this poem was a focusing on these choices over the coarse of the bereavement period—here in the states…it’s three days…or at least that’s what the poem says. I know that years before it was written, it was longer, and in the years that followed it’s shortened and yet grief has paid no acknowledgement to the time we’ve naively inflicted upon it. It never moves faster, or slower, than it’s supposed to. There is a window of time between the waves now where I can choke it down. After three days with no food, the brain starts to hallucinate a little bit, not a lot, but enough—and with day four the world begins to vibrate. If it weren’t for the nausea, the vibrations wouldn’t have mattered to me either, but the motion sickness was getting to be to much.
There’s a little dive spot in Tallahassee connected to my favorite bookstore. A place called Izzy’s. It’s a sushi bar. Well, more a bar that also has good sushi. Two tables, a bar, a couple of TV’s. All the dishes are that square silky smooth porcelain and the smell of cooking grease sort of hangs in the air. The kind of place where all the whiskey and beer come from Japan, and the walls are either a dark walnut or a light mat tan color. The first time I went there, the bartender was a heavy set gentleman who was every bit the rude, gristly, smart ass guy you want him to be in a place like that. I loved guys like that. The type of guy whose honesty just sort of flows out of his pores like milk and honey. It’s the overly nice ones, the bubbly and pretentious ones, that I can’t stand. He wasn’t there though, and in truth I was counting on his coarse textured personality to help me keep everything at bay. The bar was quiet, only a small party of three in the back, so I grabbed a spot at the bar. The bartender was a nice girl, mid twenties if I had to guess, didn’t get her name but she was kind enough without being superficial. I declined the offer of a saki, and requested a bowl of Korean BBQ instead. It’s like a chicken bite thing, where they fry them then drizzle on some sweet and spicy sauce. They’ll toss in a fried egg. I watched the wind through the window, and waited, the girls in the back gossiped over a guy one of them had recently gotten back together with. I wanted to lean over and ask, “Hey, the important thing is, are you happy?” but I didn’t. Besides what good is a stranger’s opinion, when your own four best friends are right there to decide if you are happy or not for you? Me personally, I’d rather be happy than my friends think I’m happy.
She set the food in front of me, and I ate. The food was amazing as always, and then it hit. Guilt. I was sitting there eating food, I hadn’t prepared yours yet, and my writer mind was preoccupied consuming the oral stories of four college girls bickering over fucking Todd’s latest indiscretion. Then I remembered. I remembered you weren’t at home. I remembered I called your hospital this morning and they assured me that you made it to the crematorium…safely and without issue. I remembered that they said, “Yes sir, don’t worry. I understand.” and, “Don’t worry, we’ll call you next week when the remains can be picked up.” My ears began to ring, and suddenly I couldn’t hear the girls in the back of the bar anymore. I remembered that I hadn’t made your food, because you weren’t there.
I gently pushed the bowl away, and placed my card on the counter.
Brown Bird XVIII
I found your teddy bear today…still dirty…still smelled like you. I took a deep breath and loved deeply. Everyone else always thought it was gross…not to me. To me it was just another little thing that made you—you. I held it, afraid to put it down. I didn’t want it to get messed up, I didn’t want to wash it. I wandered looking for a safe place, a place that wouldn’t poison the smell or risk a liquid. I didn’t have any bags. My back pack has that back pack smell to it. I found a cotton cloth, clean, tucked in a box, in your room. Gently, I wrapped it up inside and tucked it into a box swearing to keep it safe…so on bad days…like today…for just a moment I can remember the way you smelled. Of calm, and earth.
Brown Bird XVII
I love that you never let me fish. You were too preoccupied with diving into the water. 110 pound cannonball thrashing around in the water, chasing every cast. I cut a dozen lures lose that day just to keep you out of the vet. There wasn’t much point in casting either when the water wouldn’t sit still. But, I didn’t care, I always fucking hated fishing. All the bugs, the sun, and god damn is it fucking boring. There’s no greater waste of potential than sitting on the shore. And—since I’d already found everything I needed—I egged you on. I egged you on by casting what I had left. Then I grabbed your ball and just kept throwing it. You were so god damn happy, which made me happy. I packed up everything at the end of the day. You jumped in the truck, dripping in algae and swamp water, and we never went fishing again. We went back to the water more times than I can count, but never for fishing. I still fucking hate fishing. I never much cared for the lake either…but I loved you, so that’s what we did.
Brown Bird XVI
She was my world. She was the only reason I had left to even get out of bed. She…was the last…beautiful thing in my life. So, I don’t care about your judgments or your opinions. This is for me. This is for her. It’s for the wind. I will say what I please if it brings me any shred of comfort in losing her…because I don’t…know what else to do…other than this. I’m just aimlessly bleeding a handful of words at a time in between the chapters of bereavement overload—in between tears and screams—hoping that for some reason it will help me to immortalize her. Here…if nowhere else. Because she was there, when all others fell into judgment, fear, doubt, or some arbitrary categorical limit. None of these ideas were even known to her. She knew of only one thing—Love. So, I’ll stay in this place for as long as I need to—to keep her alive.
Brown Bird XV
I feel tired again, and I think I’ve bled enough for one day. I’ll rest instead, thinking of you.
Brown Bird XIV
When you became too weak to get into bed, I lifted you in and out each time. When you got too hot, I helped you up; when you got too cold, I helped you again. I would wake, with only a few minutes of sleep, to find you staring at me—I’d help you up and walk with you to get water. You hated being picked up, and it broke me to see you asking for help.
Brown Bird XIII
I tried to walk through the apartment, hoping the light off and my eyes closed would make it easier. I thought if I couldn’t see any of it, maybe I could cross the room without breaking down. It started to work until I caught myself with my hand out walking slow, feeling for you, and never finding you.
Brown Bird XI
All these wires and cables. These ones and zeros…oil and cogs. All I want is the moon back.
Brown Bird X
There’s a church were we used to walk. A small one. A white one. One where the parking lot’s almost always empty. One where large oak trees have long since overgrown the roof and the spire. Spanish moss blows in the wind from all it’s branches. One where attendees don’t harass you, or try to convert you, for walking by. I’ve never much cared for the church.
—But there’s a garden. It’s small and it’s hidden from the rest of the world. Tucked away from prying eyes, except for the camera on the building, but I don’t think the Pastor minds because in truth I’ve never met him…nor do I care to—
When words failed me, and my lips chapped, and my throat ran coarse from screaming…I went there. I walked to the small algae covered wood bench and watched the butterflies. Ever bird’s song a dagger of its own. The wind rustled through the plants and the vines—the moss and ivy. We talked, I smoked two cigarettes, My only solace is resting in the promises you keep.
Brown Bird IX
I opened my eyes this morning to an empty house. No one looking at me, no one waiting, no one breathing. I couldn’t breathe, so I screamed. I screamed again, then again, then again, till water dripped on the pillow and my throat had nothing left to give me. I stared at the wall, through veils of water, and collapsed again.
When I finally woke, I was still screaming.