We demand poetry in our love
Vivid sunsets
Orgasms that shake the earth
And total understanding.
 
Love is mundane
Simply being there
Listening when we don't want to listen
And hearing what we don't want to hear.
 
I can't rage against the dying light
As the poet urged
The light is all I have
Dying or otherwise.
 
We give love by our presence
No matter the cost
We have only ourselves to give.
 
So what is most important?
Comforting our loves
Or giving into our grief?
 
I could not stand alone
When my grandmother died.
I thought that I could not stand
Without her.
But I was there because
She needed me.
 
And when I could not stand
She supported me.
She held me up
She gave me strength.
 
God, whom I have cursed
For taking her from me
I cannot ask for forgiveness
For cursing you.
 
Where were you,
When Gramma begged to come home?
Where were you
When she asked for you?
 
She believed, as I did not
That you would help her
Alleviate her pain
And take her home...
 
She begged for you,
My mother heard her cry
"Jesus, take me now!"
And when you didn't
She resurrected the very sins
That Jesus claimed he died for.
 
So here we are, the faithful
and yet faithless
We stand before a headstone
And rage against what happened.
If there was a just god,
I tell my mother
We'd not be here at all.
 
 
II

My family is smothered in love
To the point that we cannot function.
So when Gramma lay dying
My brother and cousin lay grief-stricken
And could not hold her hand
Let alone perform the mundane tasks
That she truly needed to face each day.
 
Their love, they passionately said, prevented them
From being in her presence.
They couldn't stand her suffering
They couldn't stand her pain.
 
So they left it to us -
Mom, Aunt Ellen and Uncle Rodney
We were there for her.
But in the background they kept up their chorus....
You should have known, you should have....
 
 
You should have ripped them from their house
You should have squelched their dignity
You should have disregarded their wishes
You should have spare me...
 
In the end, there were four of us
In our private agony
Touching her face, her hand, her feet
We were there when she let go
 
It was a silent breath
A quiet letting go
A relaxation beyond our knowledge
A communion of our souls.
 
Was God with us in that moment?
Is this what communion means?
We held her in her final breath
Her hands, her feet, her head
She was there when we came into this world
And we were with her when she left.
 
 
© 1997 Louisa Stalnaker Hellwig