I have a fifteen minute commute from my new apartment to the station, and on the way I pass a bridge, and behind, there is Boston's skyline. That looming machine--a trap, and a blessing. When my spiritual grandmother died, she told me, her very last words to me were: "I hope you find things you never expected." Well, Pat, I certainly have! I miss you, too.
I wore my shiny, renewed clothes and my cheap, red shoes. I have torn apart much of my wardrobe--given clothes away, made pants into shorts. I missed my ex-boyfriend in that moment. While Boston's skyline diminished from increased distance--closer to the station I became, and more deeply into sadness there I also became.
You gave me sweetness and now I have this:
sadness breaths through my breast.
A far off country
and the way that we were,
like sailing for the horizon.
This was some poem I wrote as I walked. And as I turned into the station, I came upon an important scene. Seated on the floor against his army-patterned duffel bag and the wall, a man sobbed. He sobbed into his hand, as the other hand rested palm-down on his head (his fingers tangled into his black, matted hair). In this moment my sadness was with him, his weeping so touched my own weeping soul.
The next day I recited the story to a friend who, it turns out, had noticed the same man, also crying, in the same station a few hours before I discovered him.
What did this mean? That a person could have stayed in the same spot for three or more hours just sobbing and sobbing? Perhaps he was an angel--who appeared for the sake of showing us grief, of giving it to us, of inviting us into it.
I want to make sure that I weep--that I weep for the immense change that represents my existence, that I weep for loss and for tragedy that cannot be undone nor explained. I want to make sure that I weep, and weep and weep--and in the weeping welcome myself anew.
With love,
ZAC
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