I still can’t for the life of me understand why she’s gone. A graveyard and the flowers that grow in it, the Church of the Resurrection conveniently located next to an undertakers. Yes, life and death can coexist. But why is she gone?
I don’t feel close to her, even though I’m not very far behind her; yes, in a town as small as this, I can feel the undertaker and the gravedigger eyeing me up for size. As I sit here right now, looking at the rows of gravestones in front of me, I realise that they mean one of two things. Either this is heaven’s car park, or these stones are the teeth of the earth out to consume us all.
At seventy-seven I should find out soon enough. I’ll know the answers. Why is she gone? Will I be saved or consumed? How great must it feel to be dead?
All the years we spent together, the good times and the bad. Travelling around as much of the world as we could afford. Holding her hand at the news that children would never grace our lives. Her hair frizzing up on our first date as the sky opened and rain lashed down. She was so shy. So beautiful. At first I thought that I could get by on the memories, that just as life and death could coexist, so could the past and the present. But I’ve come to learn that without her my past is no longer ever present. Over fifty years together, not just a lifetime but a life truly shared, and I forget a little every day.
In losing her, I’ve lost myself. Oh, I maybe live and breathe, I’m yet to starve, my home is still warm… at least in terms of literal temperature. But I’m dead inside, all but for a beating heart that’s been badly broken. How great must it feel to be dead?
© JOSEPH “JOE” GRAHAM, [2016].
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Joe Graham 