dont mind, sometimes the rewrite is worse, sometimes better, sometimes the very same
18 years ago
anniversary re: ex-boyf
last spoke over a decade ago
writing why
saying why
about me alone today
but thru me ~> sharing
first of all:
i feel nothing
not in a bad way, just neutral
a fact. a date.
wasnt like that for a long time
evidence of how grief evolves thru time
but a type of, not all grief,
to me,
grief is sometimes too big of a catchall word
the central sentiment of grief, to me, as in, yea let's do it, throw sand on the invisible man, trace out the silhouette with fingertips
the central sentiment is, no matter how it is phrased: losing the irreplaceable.
whether a shock, whether anticipated, whether secretly privately yearned for, whether dismantled as a sidequest, whether whole tons of sand were trucked in to belay beach erosion
the inevitable is always the loss of the irreplaceable
toddler slippers so psychotically small & round their architexture could murder at a glance they are too much & one day their chubby little feet dont fit
likely, one of them was already lost long before they were officially outgrown
slipped between the bed & wall & fell out of space & time like a sitting timebomb you only find seven years after the fact & they are nine now & dont wanna play soccer anymore cos their best friend was cut from the team
that's grief. there is grief in that. tiny feet that will never be so tiny again. pitter patter run will never sound the same cos never the same height & weight (godwilling) all little ones only grow, only thrive, only gain in space & territory at this age.
grief, yea, of a kind, a certain quality
a letting go to welcome in this new day, this new way, now they dont like carrots, oh that was the season they only ate mashed potatoes, whoa the carrots are having a reprise, no they are out again, wait a cameo
a universe, a whole universe difference between this, this grief
& the grief of losing the irreplaceable with nothing there waiting in the dawn except paperwork, except more phonecalls, except coming into an understanding that nothing that nothing could ever hope to ever fill, how many ways, recognition of ever new ways, like a nightmare generator, of never filled again
death grief
given the unacceptable
& asked to still breathe about it
drive a car about it
press food to your lips & chew & swallow about it like the most mundane moments of everything about life are colluding in a gaslight together about how this isnt even a big deal
wouldn't press the red button sure
but honestly? anyone who has ever experienced death grief should be given one. like here. this is so unacceptable you can set off a whole ass nuke on jupiter about it if you press this button.
the level of catastrophe warrants it.
& if you dont think so
that's ok
i simply know you havent lost a loved one & i hope when you do, cos we all do, you are surrounded by gentle loving arms you trust.
sharing why
to share this: 
~now~
this is grief madness
grief psychosis
like falling down a water well & braced at the bottom mere inches above the inkspill waterline
where you fell from? so high above you, unreachable? only source of light? up up the tunnel of slimey cold stone holding the earth back from imminent collapse onto you? the moon or might as well be
as reachable as
cos we, the privileged, outside the immediate event horizon of what it is to have your feet in gaza, your throat caught on olive tree branches, your knuckles sore & ripped from moving rubble
we? we know that needle is moving & has been
an immense amount of effort, from each & every one of us who are alive all around this world is holding that needle from slipping further. insisting that needle move up up onto better ground, out of the red, the carnage, the children's war
people who have set themselves on fire in protest of where that needle was
wrote poems til they were assassinated about that needle
reported the news as their family was murdered, as they buried their family, as they struggled to sew stellate wounds by phone light in bombed hospitals
the vastness of the unacceptable
makes it seem as if what is
cant possibly be
that it must be a translation error
makes it seem like
if only if only they knew
if only i could tell them i could show them how unacceptable to me personally this loss this one loss even i will pick just one they would rewrite the laws of the universe about it
surely they would
they would have to
that they havent
means there is an error somewhere
a gap they arent grasping
i dont know who they is
but i know in grief a they exists
a someone at least a someone
maybe everyone who doesnt get it
who if they got it
wouldnt be like this in my proximity
use your executive perks to rewrite time
do not touch me
& at the very same time, i think with this knife you can unzip a part of me, dont worry the hurt will be a welcome distraction, cos im pretty sure i need someone to manually pump my heart for now. do you cover executive function as well or just time travel?
what do you mean you have to touch me to manually pump my heart. no. dont touch me. yes your hand inside my chest cavity you need to do it.
all of this is too much to fall under the purview of grief
like there needs to be 47 words to even begin to touch the different kinds, how they change over the course of a day, intensify, recede, like tides
the grief of: the first time i almost forgot for a fraction of a second how unacceptable the missing shape of you that touches every part of me even is
the first time i got so habituated to this that this just feels normal right? ive never not felt this way im pretty sure?