Silas' Season

It creeps up on me like the shadow of his absence.

I feel him first as a whisper breeze that cools a hot late summer day.

When a leaf leaves the tree, I fall with it

into piles of grief on the curb.

The suddenly incessant crickets every single night:

Exactly like his name in my head,

every single night.

The days tighten, losing light

as my heart constricts in anti-anticipation.

That moon, that September night, her labor and pain.

One by one, the leaves arrange into place.

The moon eases in its orbit.

The Universe rings my soul like a broken bell

when that perfect autumn eve

exactly captures the essence of the day he was born.

I cannot stand it once again

and once again I cannot move aside from the

drenching, gusting, cold fall storm

that is my face and heart and soul and hands

when his birthday is here

and he is not.

I have to settle for the fall.  For the piles I drive through.  For the crickets that sing their vigil.  For the cleansing rains.  For the chill of our loss on the last bits of summer heat, and the cold nights ahead where we have to hold each other close and let the spark of our souls keep his memory warm in our beautiful and broken hearts.

~~~~~~~~~~

What does the season of your loss look and feel like?  Has it changed the way you view that time of year entirely?  Or are there other non-seasonal triggers that remind you of the day you lost your child?  And please feel free to offer a poem of your own, if you like.

Comments

[eliza]

August is always the most miserable month in my part of Texas. Summer heat at its most brutal, its humid. The air is moist, and breathing feels oppressive. The grass, the flowers, the trees are brown and dropping, a lot is dead or dying or retreating from the heat. It's miserable. And at work, school is starting again, the fiscal year is ending again and there are deadlines every week, and there are crises and problems and too many people to hire and too much going on.

The day Gabriel was born was the first day of classes. Which is a big deal, given that I work at a university. It was a deadline for fiscal year payment vouchers and we were trying to do end of year clean-up. I felt awful about sneaking out, but I felt so wretched. Every year now, I feel awful about taking the day off, but what use am I in the office? I felt worse for Gabriel this year, as that day was the first I'd had to breathe in months, and honoring him was almost secondary to recovering my balance.

August was always a miserable month, but now it's the worst month of the year. It just feels like his birth did, wrong, hot, oppressive, scary, rushed, unsupported, unclear, death and dying everywhere. I hate it.

[Renel]

Beautiful, simply beautiful. Your words bring a feeling instead of a picture. I FEEL you. I am missing with you. I am too new to my loss to have a feeling yet about the season. I think about the summer as a time of loss when I thought it would be a time of rejoicing. I think of July as equaling death instead of life, even though Camille was born on the 30th of June. The hot thickness of the summer feels compressive and full of sick unbreathable air. I am looking forward to the fall. For the change in the seasons, away from the summer of death and into a time of reflection, hoping that my state of mind will drift and change with the falling of the leaves.
There is a crape murdle tree in our back yard that blooms in the summer. It has lavender pink tiny blossom clusters. After Camille died I remember sitting in the back yard and when the wind blew the tiny pink blossoms would gently fall on the grass. I thought it looked like a hundred pink baby girl tears falling for Camille. Even the trees were crying. I guess that crape murdle tree in our back yard will always remind me of the summer my daughter died.

[Skytimes]

Ever since that ridiculously sunny August of '07 I can't seem to enjoy summer anymore. It sucks... as soon as the heat comes up, the memories creep back. Grief-season... Saddening, paralyzing, constricting. It's just a bummer when you're wishing summer away - because it used to be my favourite time of year.

Considering my son shares his birthday with a little girl named Hope, I always wonder how different that date feels for her mom *waves to her*, with southern-hemisphere spring just around the corner and everyone being all spring-giddy. (Note to self: ask her.) In the first few months of my grief, I was utterly thankful for the dark season where I could hide behind hoodies, hats and scarfs.

I'm off to embrace autumn now. Thanks for writing this.

[sarah n.]

Chris, this is so breathtakingly beautiful, and haunting. September 12 was Otis's birthday, September 13 the first anniversary of his death. We share the sadness, the emptiness of September. Sending love to you and Lu.

[Brianna]

George died in the middle of spring. Wildflowers were in bloom everywhere. Bursts of color dotted freeway embankments, gardens, even parking lots had flowers that were growing through the asphalt. The spring he died I saw none of that at all. Everything had lost its color and was the muted grey of sadness as we waited for his death and then actually experienced it.

This spring, our first since he died, was different. I saw the colors again and although I was sad it also gave me some peace that maybe I had not had before his birthday. I look at spring and all the wildflowers that bloom as a reminder that even the briefest of lives, as those flowers bloom for such a short time, have beauty and worth. They remind me that although George was around for scarcely longer than a wildflower his life was important and brought so much beauty and color to my world. I'm grateful for spring, as if the whole world is remembering George with me.

[Heather]

Henrick was born at the very end of December. I love December. I love the holidays. We had a 3 1/2 year old daughter when Henrick died and I refused to let his death ruin the holidays for all of us. The years of Santa are short and few, and I would not waste a single one.

Then, 2 years to the day after Henrick's death, we welcomed another baby girl. I would not let Henrick's death be the dark cloud that hung over this child's birthday. I would not.

That isn't to say that the days between Christmas and the 30th aren't difficult. That I'm not reliving every second of what happened in 2007. But, now the painful bits are mostly just moments in the days that catch my breath, and then I can move on. 3 years and 8 1/2 months ago I would not have thought that to be possible.

[Sally]

In a way I am glad Hope was born in the winter (August here, on the other side of the world) as the weather now matches my mood. I have always hated winter, now I hate it even more. And given her birthday is right at the end of the season, I feel I sort of suffer through three months of winter before we get to her anniversary days. Thankfully though once they are past, spring arrives and I love the spring. The blooming daffodils, which generally appear a couple of weeks before her birthday, always signify the final count down to her days. I both love and hate daffodils. Her grave was adorned with the after her funeral. So much of our loss feels tied in to the seasons. We found out we were pregnant just before Christmas as summer was heating up and we love that time of year and of course finding out we were pregnant was just about the happiest time of our lives.
As always, another exquisite post. Simon and I are thinking of you both this September, as we always do.
xo

[Cathy]

"The Universe rings my soul like a broken bell..."

Perfectly said.

Cathy in Missouri

[sherry]

So achingly beautiful. Thinking of Silas with you on this difficult month.

[sp]

Lovely post.
I haven't experienced it yet, but I expect it will be February. Winter's passage into spring. Her birth, Valentine's Day, my birthday, and her death. It all occurred in that sequence over 17 days in February.

[Scott]

Beautiful and touching poem. I love you both.

[Monique]

Remembering Silas with you.

[A fan]

Chris, you are such a talented poet. That made me cry. The first stirrings of fall always get me excited for a new beginning, so to imagine all of that twisting into the opposite is heart-wrenching. It is indeed Silas' season. I know his new brother will honor his memory when he is finally old enough to understand.

[Liz]

Chris, my son died in Spring/Summer, but Autumn is a grieving season for me too, and this is one of his songs. I hope it gives you some of the comfort and tears and hot love it gives me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcPuDB2y0J0

[Rebecca]

Beautiful poem, Chris. Especially the last part. I lost my daughter Avery nearly 4 weeks ago on September 20th. I will share Silas Season with you as I settle for the fall for all the years to come.

I'm so sorry Silas died. I wish I had told you that when I first read about it 2 years ago when we were first FB friends. I cried for you, Lani and Silas but I was a different person before September 20th and that person did not know what to say.

We know each other from the Thorntons days in Boston. It's Rebecca V. I fucking wish I was re-connecting with you to say I was in Conn. for the weekend and wanted to try some of your coffee or that I was reminded of you when I walked past Matt Murphys and wanted to say hi. Instead, here I am, trying to navigate this new life is this world I wish none of us were a part of.

Because it's a tough time of year and you have something very special coming up, I've been hesitant to reach out to you. I thought I'd say hi here first before I share Avery's story with you via FB or email when you are least expecting it. Please let me know if you have the capacity to connect now. If not, I'll completely understand and, in the meantime, send you, Lani and the little one on his way all the good vibes I have to give at the moment.