Story of a life

I sit and cry through the night, wondering if the fire that claimed Aaron should have taken me too. Perhaps our collective conscience burned with him. I’ve witnessed more deaths in two years than in a lifetime though only through a screen. What does it mean to see it in real time? How do they smile while the sky still weeps? I wonder if love will always be unfinished. Why no happy-ever-after for me? I recall the men I have held each one a lesson in measure: how much to give, how much to trust, how much to lose. Tonight I want to be selfish, to weep the rivers dry, to press every thorn to my mouth, to taste the blood of roses broken. I should shield myself, yet I lean toward the wound again and again. You deserve all the love in the world,  he said. I wanted to believe him. I still do. But he was always leaving though technically, I left first. I always do. Here is the truth: I cannot breathe. I cannot eat, or sleep, or drink. All I crave is the spirit I knew for two brief weeks. Is...

  I run outside my breath, a gasp. My feet stop, in shock. The moon is full tonight. A breeze slides over my skin. The tide… still crashes on the shore. I try to breathe. I can’t. How has the time not stopped… tonight? I go to the sea. We sit. We wonder. We reminisce. We wonder how many school lunches they spent to fell… a man of his might. The sea takes me in her arms, whispers words of comfort just as meaningless tonight as they have been, for years. He was a man I never met, but with all the pride, and ferocity, of a sister I call him my brother. He was a man I mourn tonight, as the sea’s waves lap at my feet. Blanketed by the dark, there is no one around. I wish I could drown, that the sea will swallow me whole. I feel helpless. The weight of the world… is heavy tonight. I give charity in his name. I pray for him. I hold him in my heart. Every tear that falls from my eyes carries his name, like a cherished pearl. Morning takes me by surprise. ...