It was your child I held in my arms, beneath a sky full of fireworks I wish the stars could match, if we’d let them. When he was smaller, he called me Cwissy. He would’ve said your first name the same way, but you were Dad.
Oh, there’s something about names. In your blue eyes, I could see how clearly you saw people who were like you.
Where do we place these feelings of loss when they make us cold? My skin prickles with the loss of you. I know there’s prayer. In the stained-glass-windowed Catholic church I grew up attending on Franklin Avenue, I would cry to the songs when I was very small. The scent of incense became something I associated with death. “In This Very Room,” they’d sing, “there’s quite enough love for all of us.” Except there wasn’t, in my opinion, though the tears would fall. The person I had lost was no longer in that very room. In spirit, sure. I did believe that. But I was never much consoled by it.
It was your child who lay perfectly still in my arms as he ate a giant soft pretzel and watched the night sky full of fireworks. A glistening man-made lake surrounded us. Your family surrounded us. My family surrounded us. And I was very much consoled by it. Forever changed by it.
Thoughts?