Momma, where are you?

 You are gone. 

In the other room? Just beyond the space I am in now.

Toddler boots thumping through your empty house, calling out, “Ma? … Ma?”

Nolan's sweet persistent belief that if he was in your house you must be there.

Unchanged by preparations to the contrary.

Replaying in my mind, now, tinting the memory bittersweet.

Is that what this is? 

Believing that, in spite of what I have been told, 

if I just call out in the right tone, 

if I just walk into the next room fast enough, 

I will find you again? 

Crinkled smile reserved for children who had found you in your game?

Joy personified welcoming me into your embrace.

Laughter dancing in your eyes

Resonate in your voice.

Oh, Momma. I need to find you!!!

Please be there waiting for me.

Your house echoes without you.

My heart is lonely without you.

I will keep searching.

Until I find you.

In the curls at my brow,

The age on the back of my hands,

The joy of my child's embrace.

And I will listen for your voice.

In my heart.

When it is quiet.

Momma? Are you here?

Did I soak up enough of you while you were near?

Or will I forget?

I want you vibrant, moving, vivid

Not sunbleached in sepia tones 

Photo half-forgotten

Every person I tell 

The grief is renewed

Wellsprings seeping to the surface

Watching Daddy tell the waiter at your restaurant

Telling him that we wouldn't be waiting for you.

Not this time

Not anymore

The agony of the small deaths.

How many hundreds of times will we share this loss?

Will it become bearable?

Mourning bands.

Mourning veils.

Bring them back!!!

TO NOT HAVE TO TELL IT AGAIN

That would be a blessing.

To not tell it is to forget?

Then tell it.

Tell it as the marrow seeps from my bones,

Knees sinking to the ground,

Agony saturating my being

Crying in a friend's arms is so cathartic, but for how long?

How long is too long?

We have birthdays to celebrate,

And holidays to prepare for.

School days to plan

Work to attend

I just want to sit Shiva

I want to mourn

I want my support to surround me

Saturate me

Press in from every side

Hold me until this ache becomes less of a heartbeat and more of a melody.

MOMMA!!!! 

Momma.

momma