For us. // A dark day, cold and rainy and the atmosphere got funereal for a minute, which it does here, now and again. My mother-in-law is passing away from dementia and my country sort of is also. There are parallels between the grieving processes, all of which I experience almost second-handedly, at unstable removes.

One of the things that makes it truly difficult is learning, through trial and (regrettable, yet forgivable) error, how softly you have to tread when it isn’t yet clear (to everyone, to anyone, at any given moment) that she is dying. How feelings of guilt, anger, fear, or sadness intermittently (and unpredictably) penetrate the (relief and) forgetfulness of daily activity. How one believes, (because belief is everything), (belief is her), until the moment it becomes impossible to believe, that she is not yet lost. And how that moment disarms us, completely, leaves us feeling motherless, without a home, (or seeming impossible to ourselves.

)…(

So I have a prayer, for us.) Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem. May you never be alone in this. May you be surrounded by love and care. And may the people you have loved always be there to remind you that you are absolutely possible, solid, and real.