It would have been my father’s birthday today. Allah yerhamu. This poem was written last October.

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Two months.

The saying goes, “time heals.”

But I don’t think so. It only strips the surreal.

I think time simply reveals

That the agony is deeper and more real

Than the strongest part of us thought it could conceal.

Because the thought of re-awakening wounds,

Re-living sweet memories buried in stormy hearts

Embracing our unbearable vulnerability

Tears us inwardly violently apart

In a million ways.

Granted, time can heal. And it needs to at times.

Time will heal hurt, bad moments, unpleasant lies.

But what if I only have fond memories of you,

Memories that act as explosive fuel

For enough warmth to set my heart ablaze?

Frankly, if healing means slowly forgetting you

Then I forget who I am, too

So no, I don’t want to heal from this

Remembering you and all you gave me of bliss

This is grief.

And, in brief,

I will learn to breathe through it

Simply because I must, 

and I know you

Wouldn’t have wanted my soul to rust.

I will learn,

Through secret tears that burn,

To take all the knots in my crowded heart

And make a silk rope; just a part

Of my brilliant plan to keep climbing up

That I might be fortunate enough to be your kinda cup

Of tea

At least half as kind, sweet

Half as intelligent a mind,

Half as chivalrous as you were.

I cannot wait for time

To never heal me from remembering you and your legacy.

Looking on the bright side of an endlessly dark tunnel,

Grieving is a beautiful thing, I must say

Beautiful in its own twisted, ironic and desperate way

It’s beautiful to know that this terrible feeling

Meant I knew and loved someone worth the grieving

And that alone is a kind of healing.

Two months down.

A lifetime more to go.

-October 11, 2019

-A.S.