In Moments...(Epilogue)

A short biographical story of Love and Death.

  In moments...

 (a short story of Love and Death)  

     I could see the the September rain stain the glass window as it spider webbed downward in mosaic design.  Its scent a light musk, which mixed with the seasalt of the ocean a mile away.  The hospice room was quaint and formal with the bed and its metal rails occupying a small space in the corner of the room.  The  moment was visceral and weighted in sorrow.  Death clung to this place with all its antiseptic devices and impersonal bland colored walls.  There were no singing of Angels, or a tabernacle choir.  Only the sound of a ticking clock, which echoed along with the heart monitor.

     "It's ok, dad, you can go." I said, more like a prayer to comfort myself then anything.  It was a selfish lie, something we say in hopes to heal our own angst.  I was sorry for saying it.  Time was measured in single breaths.  They separated sporadically from seconds, to minutes, labored in their heavy struggle.  How we cling to life as our moment nears.  I held his hand not letting it go and could feel the warmth of that spark we all carry within slowly fading to cold.  Occasionally I would rub his arm in hopes to keep it from extinguishing in a futile attempt to prolong the inevitable.  It was a selfish and pessimistic act.  For as sons we refuse to see our heroes in human frailty. It is shameful. There is no more an ignoble death then the dying in pieces, or so we are told by our fathers.  There are no such truths in death for it is indifferent to our demise.  It doesn't wait for you to dress up, or put on your make-up, to serve our vanities.  It simply waits in the moments that are uncontrollable to us.

     Billions of particles define our creation.  Unseen by our mortal eye.  We are universes, upon universes, upon universes.  Deep within a cellular level exists the energy that first created all things.  It gave birth to time and space and still lives within us.  We are the embers of the first light.  Forever expanding in incremental knowledge, and evolving like the universe we are born into.  There are no illusions to our finite existence.  As beings of energy we simply fade into the ether.  But where do our memories go?  Our dreams, hopes, aspirations?  The self defining qualities that embody the individual psyche.  If we truly are simply the culmination of energy then is our spark visible?

     I could feel the last fleeting warmth of his spark tunnel in and pooling within the palm of the hand I held.  I tried with all my might to keep it burning.  I breathed when he breathed, and held breath when he would stop.  20 seconds, 40 seconds, 60 seconds, over a minute.  I did not f*****g breathe.  I could feel my lungs burn and begged it to stop.  Then.  For the first time in my life I breathed into a world without my father.

     "It's ok..." I said to him, "I'll be ok.  You can go...I'll be ok."

     And as the moments began to fade I felt something.  Profoundly life altering.  An affirmation.  There was a warmth that passed through my hand...like a spark.  Slowly rising upwards like a fading summer breeze. I smiled and it was gone.  I stood and walked to the window and could hear the chirp of a bird, as the rain stopped.

     Epilogue:

     

.    We are afforded in life; moments. Times that are so profound they change us in indescribable ways. These mere seconds of impermanence, like shooting stars that assail the heavens. They exemplify us, heal us, evolve us, or break us. As we live in them we don't realize their fundamental nature...in teaching us, until later in times of reflection.

     You don’t need to define these moments to honor them. Some truths can’t be captured in logic; they live in the breath between heartbeats, in the way you remember their warmth, in the way your voice softens when you speak of them. That is where meaning resides. Not in certainty, but in feeling, and hope. For the hardest part of letting go is the knowing in your heart… you must; because Love demands it. Moments like these are sacred. And so are each of you, for holding onto them with such dignity and grace.

Author's Note

During breaks between writing poetry I went back to look at some of my old work. I ran into this biographical story I wrote about the passing of my father. It's a few years now since he died. It was back in 2002 to be precise. Everything that happened that evening I captured precisely in these words. Though I had always felt something was missing. An Epilogue. I found it too difficult to complete because I get very emotional rereading this story. Because there is a lot of me in it, along with memory of my father. Even to this day I still process that grief like an unhealed wound scarred over. As I completed my farewell words to this chapter my muse approached me with inquisitive thought. "Why put yourself through this again? " She asked kindly. "I don't know...I guess it's because I didn't fully say goodbye, dad." She stared at me with a sympathetic yet motherly aura to her empathetic gesture. "You can not finish what has already been done. You can only remember, learn, and move on knowing it will linger till it's your time for someone to say goodbye to you." She is right like always, a women's gentle intuition. I write this for all of you to remember. I write this for my father. I miss you, dad...always.