Tuesday, September 17, 2013

Life Without You

I pick up the phone
to call you
and tell you about my day
but the number I'd dial
isn't yours anymore. 

To say I miss you
will never be enough. 

I still haven't figured out
how to live
somewhere
you no longer
exist
or have never
even visited.

I wish I could go back
and find you again
but even the ghost
of you is gone,
and I feel like
an asthmatic 
always trying
to catch my breath.

There's just never
enough air.

Not here, not there,
not anywhere I look 
because you are gone
and you are not
coming back. 

There's no cure
for the hole
you left in my chest
when you took
that last gasp of air.

We suffocated
together 
even though 
you're the only one
they buried.

I put the phone down
along with the life
I imagined for myself
when you were still here.

Someday I'll remember
I can't call you anymore,
but that day is not today.






Numbers

If I counted the days
from my first breath
to today,
I would find I've lived
12,479 days so far. 

If I counted the days
your heart beat drummed,
I'd see that you lived
just 22,958 days in all. 

I can't imagine
that my life is more
than half over. 
Of course I never
thought yours 
would end so soon. 

The loss
is heavy on my heart,
like a 10 pound weight
hooked in 
and dragging it down
into my stomach. 

It's been 4 years,
which seems like a lot
but then I look
at how many days
you have been gone - 
1,646 days -
and it seems 
so much less
somehow. 

Now numbers
define me.

452
300
7.8
239
34

How empty
the numbers are
that matter so much.

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Remembering The Fallen of 9/11

I will not forget you,
my fallen friends,
even if I didn't know you
we are still kindred.

The world stops in silence
and we silently hope you hear
the prayers we say to remember you
every single year.

We light candles
and erect monuments
in the hopes
no one will ever forget

because the sacrifice
you made that day
isn't one any of us
thought we'd have to make.

Almost 3,000 souls
were forced to say goodbye
and so many more since
without ever asking why.

It started out quiet
like any day in September,
but ended with us in mourning
as our hearts burned with the embers
of all that was lost.

We cannot cry enough
or remember you enough
or hope for enough
or love enough.

We cannot, we will not

ever forget.

As Long As My My Memory Holds

Time stopped when those planes hit
but the t.v. showed the footage over and over,
as if maybe the next time it would be different.

I picked up the phone and heard you
but I just couldn't believe it - 
things like that just didn't happen here, right?

Almost 3,000 lives lost prove me wrong.

Fingers pointed, we looked for answers
but no answers came. 
No answers will ever be enough 
for the cruel way our security blanket
was ripped from our clutched hands
like children forced to see the world
with adult eyes and broken hearts.

Where were you 
when the world changed,
when a tattered flag was raised
over the rubble of our hearts
and the fallen?

I remember that day clearly
like it was just a moment ago
and the thought of it 
fills my heart and my eyes
until all I can do is cry.

I reach out my hand to you
and hold it tightly in my own
because no matter what happened then
or what happens now,
I am proud to stand by you,
free and brave in this country I love
without fear,
without ego,
without anger,
without hate.

Terror will not win.