The Fourth Stage of Grieving


Before you can forget
You have to remember
everything
Every sweetness,
every sting
Remember it
Feel the fist
Pounding on
Your heart
Making it alive
Remember it
Feel it relentlessly
pounding
Cracking you open
Letting the light in
And
Remember the light
Feel it washing
Over you
Breathing life
Into your every vein
Remember it
Feel it run through
The shadowed scars
Dispersing all that was
dark--hurt, anger, pain
Remember it,
How the fist slowly
Opened transforming
Into hands that hold
Cradling your
Tired feet
Carrying you
Remember it
Feel it--
The pounding
Now making you
Hollow inside
Feel emptiness
be empty
Feel every
Torn, broken piece
Of you
Even as the earth
Is splitting
Pulverizing
Everything
In sight-
Sanctuaries,
The old brays
Of your heart
Be hollowed
Let the ground
swallow
You whole
Remember it
Feel it again
When you said,
"The fist! I want the fist!"
Laugh at the
absurdity of
How severely
You needed it
Laugh at the
Impossibility
made possible....
And beautiful....
Weep
as well
By god how you
Need to
Weep for it all.
Weep. Weep.
And in between
Torrents of weeping
Remember
it. Feel
it.
All of it....
Then, only then
can you forget.

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