Myrln Monday: a daughter grieves

For a while before his death in April 2008, non-blogger Myrln (aka W. A. Frankonis, i. frans nowak), posted here on Kalilily Time some kind of rant or other every Monday. Our daughter, who has salvaged his published, performed, and none-such writings, continues to send me some to post posthumously.
On this Myrln Monday, however, she adds her own grieving voice:

Myrln Mondays: There have been a few in a row now, I think, that I have missed. Forgotten. And then when I remember that I’ve forgotten I feel terrible. And ironic. Because while I have forgotten I have not nearly FORGOTTEN. Not even close. It creeps up on me unexpectedly. Often at night as I’m trying to fall asleep. And suddenly it’s upon me. The too soon-ness. Too quick-ness. Unfairness. Eeriness. Incomprehensible
-ness. Surreal-ness. And I am overcome. All the clichés exist within me at once: it’s a bad dream and I’m going to wake up and he’ll still be here.

Just one more day — one more day to be sure we said everything. Wish him back – on a star, on the moon (“I had a talk with the moon last night,” he’d say to me, “and it’s all going to be fine”) — on my worry beads. Self-admonitions, I should have gotten out there more. I should have heard something was really wrong when we talked. I should have gotten out there more. The truth of the phrase “sickening feeling” because every time it comes my stomach hollows out and I feel like I’m going to be sick.

Then it’s gone. The same way each time: full of feeling foolish, selfish, sorry-for-myself. Like I’m the only one who has ever lost someone. Only one who has ever lost her father. Who has ever lost him too quickly, unfairly, unexpectedly. The only one who has had to continue on after…

I may forget the Myrln Mondays amidst painting new rooms, preparing for homeschooling, living my life (as my father would be demanding I do anyway as he pointed out in number 8 of his life lessons poem: “Remember the dead in your heart, but honor life and the living with your time and attention because afterward it’s too late”. but I have not FORGOTTEN. Not even close. And as everyone has told me, as painful, unbearable, agonizing, maddening, sad, lonely and empty remembering is, forgetting is far, far worse that all those together. So I am remembering. And missing. And hurting. And crying. And remembering. Always.

SAND HOLE
They excavated sand,
this father and daughter,
digging to China.
I knew it’d really be closer
to Afghanistan,
but their game had a tradition
to follow.
Fathers and sons
have growing between them,
which can be another kind of hole,
while
fathers and daughters
share games and imagination.
And dug holes
always come out in China.
I wonder where the holes Chinese dig
Come out?
Waf jul99

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