Today, Yesterday, or the Day Before

would have been one month since you’re gone. 

I have no way of knowing when now.  

Did you think it was better this way?

No lingering at the door, no burdensome goodbyes, perhaps a thud, an almost silent gasp to acknowledge death’s presence?

How about me, do I think it’s better this way? I saw myself watching no life creeping steadily at your father’s bed. I was there, I saw it all.

!! but also: - .

A shock, an upheaval, then silence. 

I see myself suddenly without you, and I know I couldn’t have prevented anything, but the stealth and the blow of this thing called death didn’t prepare me for anything. 

! but also: ? and ~ before a . 

A shock, an asking, an approximation, then silence. 

So ask me: do I think it’s better this way? 

And I’ll tell you: yesterday I passed the street where the funeral parlor was, and I couldn’t look in that direction. It was momentary, but I still turned my eyes away. 

Because I remembered clearly the funeral director explaining how you will be brought to the crematorium, drawing clumsily a box, and when he finished speaking, I said, can I keep that drawing, and wrote my own notes on it. 

I will be thinking about these for a long long time.