And I've been writing for the rest of the day. That's something I don't normally allow myself to do. But I've been working hard all weekend. Cleaning and mowing and playing music for church. Plus, I went for a long run yesterday afternoon.
Obviously, this weekend I've also been preoccupied with thoughts of my sister. I'm sure tomorrow morning, when I go to work, I'll feel her there, too. I'm ready to have a few relaxing hours before bed now.
Tonight's episode of Classic Saint Marty first aired two years ago, on a really dark day . . .
August 19, 2015: Bewildered Expression, 6:27 a.m., Maggie Nelson, Unbearably Vivid Colors
And then Ives blinked and found himself standing on the sidewalk beside his wife, across the street from the Church of the Ascension. On the pavement, just by his feet, was a large piece of canvas, and under it a body, stretched out. Then the officer lifted off the canvas and shined a flashlight onto the face to reveal the shocked and bewildered expression of his son.
My sister died this morning at 6:27 a.m.
When I saw her last night, she was breathing hard, each intake hitting her chest like a hammer. I leaned over, said her name and then, "It's me. Marty." Her eyelid lifted, and she focused on me. I told her about my long day of work. I told her about classes starting next week. Just before I left, I leaned over and whispered, "You don't have to be afraid, Sal. You don't."
When I got to my parents' house at around 5 a.m., my sister was surrounded by the people who loved her. My mother and father, siblings, nieces, nephews, and best friends. We all stood around her, touched her hands and feet, told her how much we loved her.
Her breaths got slower, the spaces in between longer, and then she was simply gone.
I thought I was prepared for it. I thought I was going to hold myself together. I thought a lot of things. But, in those moments following my sister's death, I felt an incredible emptiness enter me, as if I had been scooped out like a pumpkin at Halloween. I wasn't prepared.
It has been about twelve hours since that moment. I am still not prepared for a world without my sister. For 17 years, I worked with her. Eight- and nine- and ten-hour days. I spent more time with her than any of my other siblings, and we knew each other deeply. Trusted each other deeply. Loved each other deeply, without having to say it.
There will be no cartoon tonight. No laughter.
My sister once said to me, "You know, I wish I was as strong as you."
Saint Marty isn't strong tonight. He's heartbroken.
98 from Bluets
by: Maggie Nelson
Vincent van Gogh, whose depression, some say, was likely related to temporal epilepsy, famously saw and painted the world in almost unbearably vivid colors. After his nearly unsuccessful attempt to take his life by shooting himself in the gut, when asked why he should not be saved, he famously replied, "The sadness will last forever." I imagine he was right.
 |
| I miss your smile |
And a new poem for this Sunday night . . .
1,031,200 Seconds
by: Martin Achatz
I remember that moment
when your body took that last
bite of air. Maybe it tasted
like shortcake and strawberries,
full of seed and sun and biscuit.
Or spaghetti sauce, a tomatoey gout
of garlic and basil. Maybe it filled
you with pine smoke and flame,
cricket arias under a thumbnail moon,
starlight bright as the cream in Dad's
black coffee. In that mouthful
of oxygen, perhaps you felt Superior
pulling at your thin ankles,
and you ran through waves
with our sisters, driftwood white
as skull scattered along the sandy
applause of shore. Or maybe, just maybe,
you tasted the skin of my daughter,
the way you did when she was a baby
and you buried your nose in the palm
of her neck. That's it. 1,031, 020 seconds
ago, you took a breath so sweet
that you didn't need to take another. You tucked
that breath into the wallet of your lungs,
like a lucky two dollar bill, right behind
your driver's license, a picture
of our parents on their 50th anniversary,
the key to the lockbox under your bed,
where you kept everything important
to you, each freckle and hair,
frog croak and lightning fork.
Each solar eclipse that scorched
your retinas with happiness.
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