Fast and bright and gone
I have looked everywhere for her.
I look everywhere for her. My Sister; my best loved , most hated confidant. She was never the voice in my head, never my conscience.
I don't expect anyone to read this, really. Why would they?
What would bring you here? What would make you stay? But this needs to be somewhere outside of me.
I'm sitting here in a small balcony at 2.30 am, stealing a moment with a cheap cigarette between my lips. I bought exactly two; went out to get them when my parents went to drop my brother off
to the airport.
She did this too; my sister. I imagine she did, maybe in college, behind the back gates with a bunch of friends? Then she gave it up for the kid, I guess? Not for her husband. He's the understanding sort, my brother in law.
Did she love to watch the veins burn into rings of ash, growing, growing, growing into absolutely nothing?
My Sister.
I'll never find her again, except in old voice recordings on preposterous forums like personal chats where she prompted my niece to sing birthday songs and Christmas wishes.
"Say - auntie, happy birthday!"
"Say - I love you, auntie."
There was no obituary. I guess my family thought it might be odd. There's some strange sort of stigma attached to suicide after all.
I don't know if I'm supposed to miss her this much? If my compassion and prayer is misplaced? All everyone can speak of at home is how cruel she'd been for the past year or so. But, I remember her as this gangly teenager who made sure I was safe; my sole tormentor, my protector. I remember her before she became just that one last year of her life; the girl who made sure her shy-shadow was always in on the conversation, who tried to keep me from sounding smarter when I grew up and started reading and learning and writing the world around me. The woman who I'd hangout with when she was pregnant and bed ridden, quarrel with for a niece and not a stinky boy, talk to her belly and say silly things like "there's still time! you be a woman!" It was the first time I felt a baby kick. Years later, my neice still kicks me on occasion, but it never gets quite the same reaction it did when she was a little sea monkey. She was the woman who told me about what breast feeding feels like.
She's 4 now and she's forgetting You; everyone is trying to.
I'm trying to forget how alike we were once, very long ago for the shortest whisper of time.
I look everywhere for her. My Sister; my best loved , most hated confidant. She was never the voice in my head, never my conscience.
I don't expect anyone to read this, really. Why would they?
What would bring you here? What would make you stay? But this needs to be somewhere outside of me.
I'm sitting here in a small balcony at 2.30 am, stealing a moment with a cheap cigarette between my lips. I bought exactly two; went out to get them when my parents went to drop my brother off
to the airport.
She did this too; my sister. I imagine she did, maybe in college, behind the back gates with a bunch of friends? Then she gave it up for the kid, I guess? Not for her husband. He's the understanding sort, my brother in law.
Did she love to watch the veins burn into rings of ash, growing, growing, growing into absolutely nothing?
My Sister.
I'll never find her again, except in old voice recordings on preposterous forums like personal chats where she prompted my niece to sing birthday songs and Christmas wishes.
"Say - auntie, happy birthday!"
"Say - I love you, auntie."
There was no obituary. I guess my family thought it might be odd. There's some strange sort of stigma attached to suicide after all.
I don't know if I'm supposed to miss her this much? If my compassion and prayer is misplaced? All everyone can speak of at home is how cruel she'd been for the past year or so. But, I remember her as this gangly teenager who made sure I was safe; my sole tormentor, my protector. I remember her before she became just that one last year of her life; the girl who made sure her shy-shadow was always in on the conversation, who tried to keep me from sounding smarter when I grew up and started reading and learning and writing the world around me. The woman who I'd hangout with when she was pregnant and bed ridden, quarrel with for a niece and not a stinky boy, talk to her belly and say silly things like "there's still time! you be a woman!" It was the first time I felt a baby kick. Years later, my neice still kicks me on occasion, but it never gets quite the same reaction it did when she was a little sea monkey. She was the woman who told me about what breast feeding feels like.
She's 4 now and she's forgetting You; everyone is trying to.
I'm trying to forget how alike we were once, very long ago for the shortest whisper of time.