Tag Archives: grief

shattered / fragments [3]

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His clothes are waiting.
There’s a pile on the floor,
tucked into the corner
and ready to be washed;
another on his chair,
haphazard but clean.
A few others sit in a basket,
neatly folded.

He would have picked through them
the next morning,
getting ready for the day.

I pull out a pair of black pants from the dirty pile,
notice a bungee cord strung through
as a makeshift belt.

I fold them slowly,
tuck them under my arm,
and, for now, leave everything else behind.

shattered / fragments [2]

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A police sergeant
stopped by the house this afternoon
with my son’s wallet
and an accident report
we don’t ever have to read.

He’d been first at the scene that night,
then sat in our living room
while my wife called me
in Los Angeles.

Today, I offer him a cup of coffee
and hope he’ll stay with us for a moment.

shattered / fragments [1]

6 Replies

I now understand
the meaning of

shattered.

I can’t even tell if it is okay
to smile at my wife–

but I’ll go for a walk,
and while I am out,
get her the box of chai
she was searching for.

—

I don’t know where to begin. I’ve lost my son.

I don’t know where to begin. Perhaps deciding to simply sit here, inside this not-knowing, inside this feeling of being shattered–perhaps this is something Zen gave to me, having turned out to be nothing I was actually looking for.

I don’t know where to begin. Except to return here, reach for my pencil and scratch out a few of the fragments I find.

Square with Rounded Corners

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The picture of the two of us,
pulled from my suit-coat pocket,
leans on my dresser.

Square with rounded corners,
faded blue ink–
Kodak May 1980–
printed on the back.

I scanned it for my lock screen, too,
so I can see myself
leaning up against her in the slanted spring light.

The first few days after
Mom taught me how to die
were simpler–

but when I walk outside,
leaves are turning,
afternoons are darker now.