Forget The World

23

More often than what others would deem healthy I find myself sitting in front of your grave
In every season I sit beside you, and I watch, and I wait
What I'm waiting for I do not know.
(Do I expect you to crawl your way through the earth back to me?)
More often than I'd like to admit I find myself turning to tell you something.
It is still habit to look for you when I have something to say,
Only to crash back down again when I realise that of course you're not here
(except you are).
(Can you hear me?)
I have spent half of my life with my hands resting palm down on the soil above you,
I have spent half my life without you.
I spend most of my time talking to your gravestone hoping you'd somehow get the message,
I spend most of my nights sleeping on the grass next to you.
Do you know that I pray now?
I pray to a god that I don't even believe in,
Just because it brings me peace, Just because I know it would have bought you peace too, Just because it feels like the right thing to do.
Everyday I pray the Holy Rosary,
(Were you even Catholic?)
And everyday I speak to Mary –
I tell her about you, and I tell her about my day,
I ask her to let you know, and I ask her to keep me company for a while.
You are very similar.
You are both so sad, so sorrowful.
She may be Our Lady of Sorrows, but you are Mine.
There is something so soothing to me about sitting among the dead,
It is so quiet and calm, yet so deeply distressing, but in that soft way
(The only time death escapes harshness.)
There is not a day that goes by that I do not think of holding that rose.
The thorns had all been taken off, I do not know what for,
The point of the rose is that it is defensive, tactical, protected,
(You do not rip out the claws of a kitten before you present the litter, it's not much different.)
I see the moths resting on the window ledge and I think of you,
I see spiders sitting in their webs and I think of you,
I see birds standing on tree branches and I think of you,
I see rabbits lying in the fields and I think of you.
I see myself in the mirror and I wonder if you'd know who I am.
I see your face smiling in the photograph and wonder if I even knew you at all.
But then I wear your cross, run my hands through the blades of grass above you, feel the cool stone that marks you, sleep beneath your bedspread, wear your old clothes
And I realise,
Yes, I do know you;
You are everything around me, you are in everything surrounding me,
You are in me, my heart and my soul.