xLx's blog: "Wandering"

"You're so strong" they say, "I couldn't get out of bed" they say

They tell you "I don't know how you are living day to day"

They think that I am coping - this smile that masks my grief

They think that I am coping - and it's met with great relief

But you can't see inside me and you can't read my mind

And you can't fill a hole that a child leaves behind

I have moments when everything feels like it will be okay

But I need you to know that I don't always feel that way

It's been fourteen years and many years stretch long ahead

And sometime when I'm smiling, inside I'm feeling dead

You ask me if I am "better", as though recovering from some disease

But I have lost a son and gained a pain that will not ease

How would you feel if your child had been taken away?

In a matter of years, would you really feel okay?

His life was cut short, but my love still lingers on

And for the rest of my life he remains my son

The time you have with your children you will never regret

And though our time was short, I will never forget

He is no less real, no less a person than any living child

and the tiny time we had him does not render the loss mild

I might say I see him in the sunshine, hear him when a bird sings

But I wish I didn't have to grab on to these remote and abstract things

To you it seems like beauty, like I'm finding ways to live

But I'm only holding on to the little life can give

Half the time I don't know what I actually feel

Most of the time the fact that he's gone seems horribly surreal

And I scream, I cry, I rage but I do it all in silence

And my exterior seems serene while my interior's in violence

But these thoughts are too dark, too strange for me to say aloud

And so I stay silent, and you say "You're strong - I'm proud"

I know you're trying to help, that you don't know what to say

But please don't believe me when I reply that "I'm Okay"