To breathe him in once more

Sleeping in my twilight world, I can see him. His profile sharp and clear. I reach over, to touch his face.....but he's gone. I wander the house, touching things, remembering. Today I am crying. Tears, unbidden, slide down my cheeks. How do I stop this ache? How does life without him hold the same meaning? The same joy? It never will, and I resign myself to this fact, not with bitterness, but with resolve to honor his wishes.
I sit in the leather chair he sat in, it still holds his form somehow. I feel his arms around me, in some strange and secret way, I feel him there. I still don't believe he isn't coming back. Ever. What dimension will I find him in if I look hard enough? What place does he inhabit besides my broken heart? It isn't as if I can deny his death. I was there. I saw it all. For four long years I watched as he struggled between false hope and despair. I watched and waited, still hoping there would be a time for compassion and honesty, a time of unselfishness and giving. It was not to be.

He tried to be strong for me. He didn't want to go, not yet. It wasn't his time, but he knew finally, there would be no kidney. There would be no reprieve from the pain.  I did not know that the promises I made to him would haunt me until I began his story.

I want to breathe him in once more. I want to feel his arms around my waist, his hand in mine. I want to see him laugh again, to swing a golf club, to hug a friend.

I go outside and look at his trees. The fir trees now tower over the yard, giving shelter to the same birds that have built their nests in them, year after year. The Lindens he planted stand tall, soon there will be the heady fragrance of the flowers, the bees harvesting their sweetness, and I remember how much he loved this life.  Each day, when the mourning dove comes to sit and cry on my deck, I wonder does she cry for me? For us? When the blue jay screeches his anger, I wonder if it is my anger that he screams to the morning sky?  

I can't bring him back, but I can talk about it now, and pray that another life will not be lost because of falsehoods. My life has been irrevocably changed. Why?

I am grateful to the ones who DID come forward to try. I am grateful for the wonderful care and love he received, from the doctors and nurses, from friends who truly loved him and I am grateful that I had him in my life, even though his feet were not firmly planted in this earth, he was of another place.