On 21 June, I noticed a tweet by my dear Twitter pal, Tessa, that read:
“Paul’s very ill…Scared witless. Ambulances here.”
Not knowing it was the evening of her birthday, I immediately replied, sending hope that everything would be okay.
It wasn’t.
A few hours later, I was hearing the unthinkable words…
“The love of my life, one beautiful, funny, rock of a man has died.”
Since then, though we brush paths on Twitter, I observe her grief, feeling utterly helpless that, in this digital world, all we have are words. And empty words of comfort don’t do justice to a thing like this.
This is my personal attempt to imagine what it must be like to lose someone so dear – which is to say, unfathomable. It’s dedicated to Tessa, just because…I don’t know what else I can do.
Emptiness is not nothingness.
It is the absence of
Something.
That was there.
Once.
A void so great
It sucks life
Out of the air
And turns you
In. Side. Out.
Unsure, anymore
What space you occupy
What time you travel
Non-linear as the day
They left.
Where am I?
Who am I?
Were you even here?
And if so,
Show me the exact
Dimensions of the space
So I can stuff it full and
Shut. The. Door.
But no.
It’s a space where only you can go.
Never the same
For having met you.
Forever changed
Now that you’re gone.
Am I supposed to thank you?
Am I supposed to curse the day
You ever came and made a place
Where only memories
Echo
Loudly of your loss?
Time heals all
Blah blah blah
Well, fuck time.
And fuck the big bang who created it.
I’ll exist.
Right here
Beside you.
Wherever it is that you went.
Until we’re done…..
♦
Please visit Tessa’s post on Paul, while you’re there, read the Valentine’s Day post she wrote for him last year. Send her some love…
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Credit for original source images is as follows:
‘Dark tunnel – Please stay here’ by Karoly Czifra
‘Empty page’ by Shirin Winiger
Alarna Rose Gray 