From A Distance

I sat there in my defiance
And watched from a distance
Refusing to go any closer
And take one last look
I could see well enough
From here, I told myself
I didn't want that to be
My last memory of her
The attendants came in
And folded the white pillowed
Cloth in around her
And closed the lid
Of the soft gray coffin
Then centered the flowers
On the top of it
The music played
The family came in
The minister began to speak

I sat there in my arrogance
And watched from a distance
Thinking how hard it
Must be for the family
To be sitting up there
On those first few rows
So close to the coffin
Knowing a loved one is inside
I wondered just how many
Times have I been here
In the house of mourning
Too many, I didn't need to count
Bits and pieces of different
Funerals came to mind
When I'd been there for
Many friends and a lover
And even my own distant relatives'
But no one really close to me has died

I stood there in my denial
And watched from a distance
As they set the coffin down
On rollers above the vault
I thought again of the family
Sitting right there next to the coffin
How hard it must be
To know that they're gone
They'll never see them again
The minister said his last words
And then it was over
You noticed a tear
And said it was okay to cry
You thought this funeral
Might bring closure for me
To my grandparents' deaths
Not until that very moment
Did I even remember they were gone

I sit here in my pain
And watch no longer from a distance
As my stone facade crumbles
Leaving my heart aching
For I too have loved ones to mourn
But for them I did not
Take that one last look
That is not my last memory
For them I did not sit on the front row
Next to their coffins
Knowing that they were inside
For them I did not see
Their coffins above the vault
But just because I did not see it
Doesn't mean it didn't happen
It did and I will never see them again
And now I must say good-bye
Even if it's from a distance

11.14.01

CMT

Author's Notes

It totally amazes me how the mind works. How you can know something and not know it, all at the same time. I know that my grandparents are both dead. I have a small photo of them on my desk at work. I look at that picture many times during the day, missing and loving them both.

Then I got a phone call from Georgia telling me that a mutual friend of ours had died suddenly over the weekend and she gave me info about the funeral. I immediately felt the need to attend the funeral out of respect for her and our friendship, and to support Georgia. It never even entered my mind that it might be difficult for me to attend because of the deaths of my grandparents. My only concern was doing the right thing for everyone else.

So, not until Kodi mentioned my grandparents did I even make a connection. You see I did not attend the funerals of either of my grandparents. My grandmother died in January, the weather was quite bad at the time, and even my mother didn't attend. Then my grandfather died in June. I wanted to go, but I didn't have the money to fly up there. To be totally honest though, I really didn't want to attend their funerals. I didn't want my very last memory to be of them lying there in a coffin. But now in hindsight, that might not have been such a bad thing. It might have helped me to be more accepting of their deaths.