Asking Him

Inside the baby an egg,
of emergency.
A bird of interpretation
on the tip of his thumb.

I could not leave him,
behind the locked door
of his secret wings beating,

knowing
every living thing
was less forlorn.

Why?
Why did you refuse
to believe, life
was intended to be more...

not merely a rest a while
in a sad defenseless world?

Simple Thoughts...

It often strikes me as I go about the "normal" business of living, how normal it is NOT that he is gone now.
It's much too hard to explain this to someone who doesn't feel it, or hasn't felt it too, who knows what I mean when I say that even television makes me sad. Buying something new, eating without him, remembering a family funny, or something he used to like makes me sad.

There are so many of these small moments every single day. He isn't planning anything, or looking forward to anything. He isn't experiencing anything.
Even my hair cries.

So much seems out of place still. Especially the people his age walking and laughing on the street, or riding the bus, or sitting in a restaurant. Or waiting for my last two sons to pass the age of nineteen safely.
My sons don't know, couldn't realize, how I obsess and fear over their safe passage past nineteen.

I don't know why I still look for him on the street. But I do.
I think... life was so beautiful, how could you leave when life was still so beautiful?!

And I still don't know how to be a whole person in the presence of a whole person.

If I had opened that door sooner. If I had forgotten something to put in his room, or something I had forgotten to say to him, or a hundred other things that would have delayed him, made him too afraid, created a distraction...

A hundred things could have happened but they didn't. Only one thing happened. That one thing...

Out of all the horrors I could imagine that could happen in my life, this was not one of them.
It just wasn't. I thought the worst thing would be homelessness, going hungry, being without a friend in the world. But those things now are not the horror I imagined them to be.
Not the horror at all.

Time

The battleships are speeding along the fault
of the earthquake.
But the enemy has already gone
beyond the milky horizon of north stars.

Someone thinks of you. Put out in the distance.
Life curling up into a heart shaped fist.
The last star in the sky
is falling one thousand breaths between us.

But God knows in the end, all we wish for are dreams
waving to us from train steps or steam ships,
and the young are favored forever unlike old faces
of debt and war.

Oh, old century of ashes and graves... it is time to leave
before Spring again. How suddenly the hour
changes the leaves in this gasp of life.

Nina Simone

One night the moon came down
and punched me... right in the eye.

Ever since then, I don't sleep much.
I see the most terrifying things.

Also things so beautiful
that looking is almost shameful.

And my head wobbles a lot
and there's a constant sniffle in my chest

always ready to burst into an ocean, and God...
how blesséd is the moon.

Sometimes... it aches.
Where the needle went in.

Stigmata for a son.

Sleep thrashing,
noose swinging.

It makes me lonely
all this night watching -
the death vapor drawing flies.

And as long as I remember,
nothing can come in
or out

from the space
where his empty eyes punched a hole.

Sometimes it asks......

A Little Boy's Letter To His Lost Brother

I found this tonight in my son's homework folder.
He has written this for his Language Arts class.
It is a breakthrough for him. For us.
He has never spoken so candidly and with his heart openly like this before.
I feel blessed...



My Gamecube

by Mario Armijo
October 2009


My favorite most important posession to me is my Gamecube given to me by my brother Dallas. Well, but my brother Tyto had to give it to me.
The reason it's so special to me, because he died on July 12, 2007. He died of a drug overdose and that's the reason why my brother Tyto had to give it to me. My brother Dallas didn't have the chance to give it to me before his death.

It tore my family apart and we are getting better at coping with each other.
But for the longest time I couldn't cope myself, but I know my brother would want me to live a happy life so I started to become happy again.
He died at the age of nineteen.
One of the reasons it's so precious to me, is that we would always play video games together and I never did play that Gamecube with him.

So I hold on to the memories that we had together.
Another reason it's of great value to me is that it's the only thing I have of him.
I don't use it anymore. Not of pain and grief it gives me, because I value it too much to play with it as a toy.
I keep it as a special part of me.

But I don't think of sorrow when I see it or think of it, I merely think of happiness and nirvana.
And I know some people think I am insane to talk about it being peace and tranquility, but it makes me think of the good times I had with my brother, and I'm not joking when I say there was never a bad day with my brother Dallas.
That's why it gives me peace.

I still have sadness in my heart and I always will but I can laugh without feeling guilty, I can have fun without feeling guilty, I can find happiness without feeling guilty.

The only things that I can't let go are thoughts of why him? why now?
And who he could have been. I wish we had more time. I love my brother with all my heart, he was my brother, best friend, mentor.

It's hard growing up without my brother Dallas. But I know he would want me to move on. Not over him, but move on in life.

If I had one wish, I would bring my brother Dally back and I would fix all the problems my family goes through. The pain my family goes through, the pain my brothers go through, the pain my mother goes through, the woman who has kept me alive for fourteen years.
I used to wish it was me not him. I used to be in denial.

But I realized that that's the way life is. That is what it does. Life can be beautiful, it can be ugly so why stay mad at the world or blame anybody?
My brother made his choice. Maybe he didn't have a choice because he couldn't get off the addiction because it was too strong.

But I loved him, still love him no matter what.
I was 12 years old when this happened. I was at summer school when this happened. I came home and found him, me and my mom found him in the room and I still remember the morning of that day.
I told him I can't wait to get back from summer school so we could play X-Box.
And he told me he loved me and I did the same. I gave him a hug and I was on with my day.

That is why the Gamecube is so important to me. And I will hold it forever until it is my time to go.
Rest in peace Dally October 10 1987-July 12 2007.

Strange... how they can announce
the arrival of your soul
but not the moment
when it leaves.

If I hold myself up
to the light
you can see right through.

Please believe me...
nothing of any sound
is like the rush
of permanent silence

from the mouth
of your dead child
shipwrecked
in Heaven.

For The Newly Bereaved Who Have Feelings Of Isolation

Sometimes, when the grief is so overwhelming, and no one can reach me or no one knows to try... I find myself relating more to death than to anything living. More to the ghostly spectre of the shadow, than anything beautiful under the sun.

And I think of how God sees intentions, that God knows it is not my intention to float towards the dead in me, and that I am forgiven and that I am alive for these small moments to realize that. And that God only allows it now in portions not all at once, and only allows it to last a little while before the living beckons me back.

And though it is cyclical... awake and resting, awake and resting... I inevitably will always wander back.
This new part of me that has grown inside like an extra organ that if removed, would remove my very soul.

I must live with my dead one now where he is, like a retreat, a summer house, so that I am able to exist in the place of now. I try to explain it this way, if I can explain it at all though it seems so meaningless.

One may think it possible to force the soul to desire the sun like a moth does flame.
For some, perhaps this is the way of it. But God has a seperate purpose and reason for everyone.

Sorrow is as much a part of me as my heart and lung, the cells of memory flowing back and forth unseen through their tiny tunnels. Attempting to take this from me, to expect it away, is nothing less than condemning me to a world of indifference and silence.

I hear the music... too deeply, I see the beauty inside of the beauty, I speak the words rushing past the dam that has always forced them back, and it is because of this sorrow, because of this sorrow spilling from my marrow that I am lonely... because I am never in the place where I am.

It takes time they say, to start time again. But if you do not understand, I will only speak as you are able to hear me. And then my words always risk absurdity or exaggerated idiocy.

It is awful for me to exist in a world of comedic theatre and gripless moments; my hand always stroking the space over my heart that shakes.
But it is equally hard for the crazy joy to die in me the moment after having felt it.

Perhaps my mad soup seems stranger, nearer to insanity, from your distance.
But take my sunshine when the sun shines, it shines no less as truth, whenever it is true.
And wait for me, when the shadow comes to occupy my time. This too is a great truth.

When I emerge, I am always a newer and softer egg.
Growing again under the very sunshine I cyclically flee from.
Oh, Life itself is a contradiction and meant to be learned. Meant to be felt and understood.
And eventually accepted. Is not sorrow like joy such a thing?

Forgiving And Letting Go

Living through the death of a child is the ultimate sacrificial purification of the soul I think that anyone can experience. Living through it is tricky. Living through it is a testament to.... to...
I am trying to find the correct word, the precise definition, but it fails me. It fails me because it encompasses all things, thoughts, relationships. It encompasses your very own soul and since that is an eternal and limitless thing... how does one truly define that?

My son's death has taught me things I never would have known. I think one of the most important things, if not the most important thing, was examining my relationships. Not only with family members, but with friends and even strangers. To repair my relationships if they were wrong, or strengthen them if they were good.

One of the greatest sadnesses of my son's life was that his family was fractured, separated, often times at war or indifference between one member or another through divorce, disregard, ignorance. He was too wise for his age, he knew what was important, tried to fix what he could and never felt able to correct things. It wasn't his place perhaps, but it was his hearts desire.

He lived in his time, what I lived in mine. He suffered the same sadnesses and disappointments of familial dysfunction that I had faced myself and we often discussed the why's, how's and what if's. And one of the greatest things that I carry with me for comfort, is his constant thankfulness to me for being the mother he knew had always loved him altruistically. He assured me he understood, that everything I had ever done was because of my love for him. All the lectures and restrictions, allowing him to fall, but always waiting nearby to pick him up and wash his knees. The anger and the frustration with him. That he was able to tell me this many times while he was alive, has been the greatest blessing to me.

That he understood... it is something that is priceless. It is priceless.
And after he died, It was hard for me to remember all the sadnesses others had caused him in his life. Sometimes he was shunned by the people in his own family because of his drug use, because he needed them so much but they either could not give of themself or refused to. And I have thought for the last two years that he is in a place of forgiveness now. That he would want me while I'm still alive, to seek the path of forgiveness and repair.

And so, this has been something I have forced myself to do until it didn't feel forced anymore but natural. I have wiped slates clean and forgiven what I could forgive. Not only for the ones who had all of my life, and then all of my son's life, took little care to nurture our hearts and souls, but for myself. For myself so that I could move on from anger and sadness.

But as we all know, not everything works out the way we think it will or should be.
One can give their best attempts with their whole heart.
It doesn't mean you will change people or their ways and thought process, or that they will suddenly become someone else.

No. The only person that has become someone else is you. You is the only thing you can change. The only person you can control or be sure learns the lessons that must be learned.
And it may be sad, it may be something you can't believe. Because in your mind, you believe that the death of your child is as life altering for others as it is for you. And then you see dysfunctional people continue to be dysfunctional by choice, habit or indifference. They continue on their same destructive path and it is as if this ultimate devastation has never occurred.

It can be very sobering. But what I have learned is that it's okay, after you forgive them to let them go. Because you are now someone else, you are not their victim or their collaborator. You are not their punching bag, or the silent witness to their sick behavior. This is one of the important things you must learn.

That you forgive, is all that matters. And I know my son knows that I have tried and even succeeded in the acts of forgiveness. But he does not expect me to continue in the torturous emptiness of some relationships. Relationships that never served me before his death and mine, but certainly have no place in my life after my rebirth.

I deserve more than that. Every human being deserves nothing less than Love, honesty, faithfulness, genuine care, and compassion. And if the people in your life can not or will not give that to you, it is okay to let go. Wish them well, but let them go. For your safety, your sanity and your very soul.

Forgiveness isn't something that comes easy to humans, but it is something that can be learned and appreciated. Give yourself permission to forgive. Then, if you must, give yourself permission to let go. If you know you have tried your best to repair a wrong, to assist in repairing a relationship, to stay faithful to what you have learned, then it is okay to let go of what no longer belongs. That includes any relationship that is destructive or dysfunctional and painful.

The time to Love is so short. If someone does not accept that Love, there are so many others who crave it. You can Love people from afar too.
Trust in your new life. Forgive, Love, and be kind to yourself. Respect yourself enough not to allow yourself to settle for less than your personal bliss.........