I didn’t want to feel it

The weight of the casket felt light

As we carried it to the hearse

I was blank mentally

As if I couldn’t be present

My mind has a defense mechanism that shuts off

Emotion when it decides this is too painful

My grandfather dying was too much

I looked at her as she lay peacefully in the casket

It wasn’t her

I didn’t understand

I was so in love with her spirit

I couldn’t look at her, it was too painful

She was gone

I didn’t mean to break her spirit, it was unintentional

Please forgive me

She was too weak and old to jump into my truck

She was so regal

A protector of old ideas

And my spirit

Loyalty and understanding as no other connection I have ever felt

When she tried to jump out of my truck she hurt herself

And hit the ground with a thud

It broke something inside me

The tears kept coming

As I walked her to her death

I sat alone. In a congregation of people who were there to honor a man

I didn’t know.

My father.

The program said his full name,

I never knew

Cornelius

Please forgive me

I want to be able to love again

And feel alive

I don’t want to be afraid

But when you know… You just can’t go back

I ask people sometimes

Would you rather feel love in the most intense way possible knowing that it will end,

Or would you rather have a mediocre love for a lifetime?

I know what I have always chosen

Tears at the end