October 20: "Grave," Dead People, Sally

I know I'm not the only person who speaks to dead people.

For some reason these last few weeks, my sister, Sally, has been on my mind a lot.  I don't know why.  I've had dreams about her.  I wake up in the morning thinking about her.  At night, as I'm falling asleep, I can almost sense her close by.  A couple days ago, I whispered her name, told her how much I missed her.

Billy Collins visits his parents . . . 

Grave

by: Billy Collins

What do you think of my new glasses
I asked as I stood under a shade tree
before the joined grave of my parents,

and what followed was a long silence
that descended on the rows of the dead
and on the fields and the woods beyond,

one of the one hundred kinds of silence
according to the Chinese belief,
each one distinct from the others,

but the differences being so faint
that only a few special monks
were able to tell them all apart.

They make you look very scholarly,
I heard my mother say
once I lay down on the ground

and pressed an ear into the soft grass.
Then I rolled over and pressed
my other ear to the ground,

the ear my father likes to speak into,
but he would say nothing,
and I could not find a silence

among 100 Chinese silences
that would fit the one that he created
even though I was the one

who had just made up the business
on the 100 Chinese silences--
the Silence of the Night Boat

and the Silence of the Lotus,
cousin to the Silence of the Temple Bell
only deeper and softer, like petals at its farthest edges.

I haven't gone to visit my sister's grave, although I drive by the cemetery on a fairly frequent basis.  She's not really there.  I know that.  Aside from my close family and friends, not a whole lot of people I meet on a daily basis remember Sally, which is strange because she was such a huge presence when she was alive.

I suppose that's what it's like when most people die.  They sort of fade away to the point where you can't even remember what their voices sounded like.  Even their faces may become indistinct.  Pretty soon, the dearly departed are just . . . departed.  

The holiday season was my sister's favorite time of year.  She loved the decorations and movies and music and cookies.  And she spoiled people with presents all the time.  I've never met a more generous, giving person ever.  If someone she loved was in need, she helped them out.  A couple times during my married life, I found myself unable to pay my bills.  Sally recognized when I was struggling like this, and, quietly, without any expectation of acknowledgement, she would hand me an envelope of money or transfer funds into my checking account.

That's who Sally was.

I don't know why Sally has been so present in my mind recently.  She's been gone from my life almost ten years now, but I hope, if I'm ever financially stable enough, that I follow her example:  giving without receiving, loving deeply.  Always.

Saint Marty went for a walk this evening, just as the sun was setting.  Lots of purple and pink.  Sally would have loved it.

July 17: "Boyhood," Sister's Birthday, Living and Afterliving

Billy Collins plays with his model train . . . 

Boyhood

by: Billy Collins

Alone in the basement,

I would sometimes lower one eye

to the level of the narrow train track

to watch the puffing locomotive

pull the cars around a curve

then bear down on me with its dazzling eye.

What was in those moments

before I lifted my head and let the train

go rocking by under my nose?

I remember not caring much

about the fake grass or the buildings

that made up the miniature town.

The same went for the station and the master,

the crossing gates and flashing lights,

the milk car, the pencil-size logs,

the metallic men and women,

the dangling water tower,

and the round mirror for a pond.

All I wanted was to be blinded

over and over by this shaking light

as the train stuck fast to its oval course.

Or better still, to close my eyes,

to stay there on the cold narrow rails

and let the train tunnel through me

the way it tunneled through the mountain

painted the color of rock,

and then there would be nothing

but the long whistling through the dark--

no basement, no boy,

no everlasting summer afternoon.

I remember those long, long days as a kid.  Summer vacation seemed to last forever, each moment an eternity.  As you get older, time has a way of speeding up like a runaway train.  One day, you're twelve, and the next, you're planning for retirement.

Today was one of those long, quiet days that seemed to stretch and stretch, where the horizon never gets any closer.  I was supposed to take my son and niece on a Pictured Rocks boat cruise in the afternoon.  Had the tickets all purchased.  Then I received a text a little after 8 a.m. saying that all the cruises had been canceled for the day due to rain and high winds.

And it did rain and blow pretty much all day.  Thought about going geocaching, but the weather just didn't cooperate.  Instead, we watched a movie--Letters from the Big Man.  Yes, it was another Bigfoot movie, and I think my niece liked it.   Then, I picked up my wife from work.

On the way home, I stopped by the cemetery to wish my sister, Sally, a happy birthday.  She would have been 63 today.  In my mind, I imagine she would have been retired for a few years by now,  Maybe bought an RV and gone cross-country camping.  Or scheduled monthly trips to Disney World (one of her favorite places).  Or taken up oil painting.  Or just relaxed, all day, every day--something she never really allowed herself to do all that much.

She's been close by me all day long.  I woke thinking about her.  Scribbled things in my journal about her during the day.  When I dug a hand into my son's bucket of leftover Independence Day parade candy, I pulled out a banana Laffy Taffy--Sally's favorite.  Even though she's been gone for nine years, she's never really been gone for me.  

Tonight, one of my oldest friends (the best man at my wedding), stopped by for dinner and games.  He's visiting from New Zealand.  So, he brought Chinese food, and my kids and niece and wife and sister-in-law (who's been my little sister since my wife and I started dating) and Brian and I played games and laughed.  A lot.  He stayed late--left a little after midnight.

This week is a treasure trove of grace for Saint Marty, filled with love and some of his favorite people, living and afterliving.  

NOTE:  I had some internet and router issues last night, so that's why this is so late in being posted.

October 20: "Three Poems for James Wright," People I've Lost, Perpetual Light

Mary Oliver says farewell to a friend . . . 

Three Poems for James Wright

by:  Mary Oliver

1.  Hearing of Your Illness

I went out

from the news of your illness

like a broken bone.

I spoke your name

to the sickle moon and saw her white wing

fall back toward the blackness, but she

rowed deep past that hesitation, and

kept rising

Then I went down

to a black creek and alder grove

that is Ohio like nothing else is

and told them.  There was an owl there,

sick of its hunger but still

trapped in it, unable to be anything else.

And the creek

rippled on down over some dark rocks

and the alders

breathed fast in their red blossoms.

Then I lay down in a rank and spring-sweet field.

Weeds sprouting in the darkness, and some

small creatures rustling about, living their lives

as they do, moment by moment.

I felt better, telling them about you.

They know what pain is, and they knew you, 

and they would have stopped too, as I

was longing to do, everything, the hunger

and the flowing.

That they could not--

merely loved you and waited 

to take you back

as a stone,

as a small quick Ohio creek,

as the beautiful pulse of everything,

meanwhile not missing one shred of their own

assignments of song

and muscle--

was what I learned there, so I

got up finally, with a grief

worthy of you, and went home.

2.  Early Morning in Ohio

A late snowfall.

In the white morning the trains

whistle and bang in the freightyard,

shifting track, getting ready

to get on with it, to roll out

into the country again to get

far away from here and closer

to somewhere else.

A mile away, leaving the house, I hear them

and stop, astonished.

Of course, I thought they would stop

when you did.  I thought you'd never sicken

anyway, or, if you did, Ohio

would fall down too, barn

by bright barn, into

hillsides of pain:  torn boards,

bent nails, shattered

windows.  My old dog

who doesn't know yet he is only mortal

bounds limping away

through the weeds, and I don't do

anything to stop him.  

I remember 

what you said.

And think how somewhere is Tuscany

a small spider might even now

be stepping forth, testing

the silks of her web, the morning air,

the possibilities; maybe even, who knows,

singing a tiny song.

And if the whistling of the trains drags through me

like wire, well, I can hurt can't I?  The white fields

burn or my eyes swim, whichever; anyway I whistle

to the old dog and when he comes finally

I fall to my knees in the glittering snow, I throw

my arms around him.

3.  The Rose

I had a red rose to send you,

but it reeked of occasion, I thought,

so I didn't.  Anyway

it was the time

the willows do what they do

every spring, so I cut some

down by a dark Ohio creek and was ready

to mail them to you when the news came

that nothing

could come to you

in time anymore 

ever.

I put down the phone

and I thought I saw, on the floor of the room, suddenly,

a large box,

and I knew, the next thing I had to do, 

was lift it

and I didn't know if I could.

Well, I did.

But don't call it anything

but what it was--the voice

of a small bird singing inside, Lord,

how it sang, and kept singing!

how it keeps singing!

in its deep

and miraculous

composure.

This is one of the longest Mary Oliver poems I've ever read.  But saying farewell to someone you care about isn't easy.  It's complicated and can take a long time.  Even when you know that the illness is relentless and end is near, it still turns you into a broken bone.  The fracture may heal, but, when rain or snow comes, you will still feel the ghost of pain.

It is Friday evening, and I'm dead tired.  Recently, I've been thinking a lot about people I've lost--sisters, parents, a brother, friends.  Autumn prompts this kind of reflection in me.  I think it has something to do with the world getting ready for a long winter's nap.  

We are approaching All Saint's Day and All Soul's Day.  I've always felt like the veil between this world and the next is a little thinner this time of year.  The spirits of the dead are nearby, tapping on windows, haunting doorsteps.  Many times this week, I've found myself sitting at my desk, staring out my office window at the church steeple across the street, thinking of my catalogue of lost loved ones.

Don't worry.  I'm not going to get all maudlin in this post, although, as night stretches out its fingers earlier and earlier to snatch the sun out of the heavens, I do tend to become more reflective and, maybe, a little sadder.  But I'm not adding logs to that melancholy fire here.  

This afternoon, I drove by the cemetery where my sister and parents were laid to rest.  As I always do, I said a little prayer for them.  Then I thought of all the other headstones in that necropolis.  Some of those dearly departed have probably been forgotten by the living world, their names not given oxygen for years and years.

So, I'm including my lost loved ones' names in this post, to mark that they existed and were important and loved.  In a Catholic funeral Mass, there's a prayer that's recited near the end of the service:  "Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them.  May their souls, and all the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace.  Amen."

As you read my list below, please recite a little prayer for my people.  Or, if you knew them, remember their smiles or voices or laughter.  Or just say their names.  Give them breath,  Acknowledge they were here.  And add the names of your dead.  Honor them.  With words.  And memory.

Saint Marty's dead:  Kevin Achatz . . . Sally Achatz . . . Fred Achatz . . . Betty Achatz . . . Rosemarie Achatz . . . Cheryl Hoiem . . . Emmett Hoiem . . . Corinne Hoiem . . . Bruce Hoiem . . . Sally Zanetti . . . Ray Ventre . . . Helen Haskell Remien . . . 

September 17: "The Swan," Paradise, Prayer Card

Mary Oliver ponders paradise . . .

The Swan

by:  Mary Oliver

Across the wide waters

     something comes

          floating--a slim

               and delicate

ship, filled

     with white flowers--

          and it moves

               on its miraculous muscles

as though time didn't exist,

     as though bringing such gifts

          to the dry shore

               was a happiness

almost beyond bearing.

     And now it turns its dark eyes,

          it rearranges

               the clouds of its wings,

it trails

     an elaborate webbed foot,

          the color of charcoal.

               Soon it will be here.

Oh, what shall I do

     when that poppy-colored beak

          rests in my hand?

               Said Mrs. Blake of the poet:

I miss my husband's company--

     he is so often

          in paradise.

               Of course! the path to heaven

doesn't lie down in flat miles.

     It's in the imagination

          with which you perceive

               this world,

and the gestures

     with which you honor it.

          Oh, what will I do, what will I say, when those

               white wings

            touch the shore?

Oliver says the path to heaven doesn't stretch out before us in flat miles.  No, the way to nirvana is about how you perceive the world around you, and how you praise it for all of its blessings.  Oliver even drags out the big gun--William Blake, who, she notes, was often lost in paradise, according to his wife, because of his poetic imagination.

For some reason, the path to paradise has seemed very close to me today.  I attended two church services this morning, and, as I played and sang the hymns, recited the prayers, listened to the readings and pastor's message, I found myself sort of breaking open like a seed, reaching through the dirt toward light and water.  Or maybe I was like Mary Oliver, watching that swan glide over the water with its cloud of wings, me brought to a standstill by its miraculous approach.

Whatever metaphor you prefer, I've felt very raw and vulnerable today.  I know that I just passed the birthday of my brother, Kevin, who died about nine years ago.  The beginning of September is also the anniversary of my sister Sally's funeral, which happened eight years ago.  Maybe it's simply the shift from summer to fall, the world preparing to go fallow for six or seven months.

Or it may be something much simpler.  Yesterday, as I was sifting through the junk I hauled out of my old car, I came across a prayer card from my sister Rose's funeral.  On one side is a picture of an angel in a gauzy white gown, her head crowned with white flowers (possibly daisies), swan wings spread against a starry sky.  On the other side, an almost thumbnail photo of Rose above the words to the "Hail Mary."

I've been carrying this card around with me since yesterday, thinking of Rose every time I took it out of my pocket to look at.

Perhaps heaven really is closer than any of us think.  It may be all around us, every day.  In the morning light puddled on the grass.  In a swan slowly sailing across a lake.  In a little card found in the glovebox of a car.

What will Saint Marty do, what will he say, when the tips of those angelic swan wings brush the tears away from the shores of his eyes?

September 1: "The Egret," Disengaged, Falling Apples

Mary Oliver does some bird watching . . . 

The Egret

by:  Mary Oliver

Every time                                    and the white scrolls

but one                                          of her belly, 

the little fish                                 and the white flame

and the green                                of her head.

and spotted frogs                          What more can you say

know                                             about such wild swimmers?

the egret's bamboo legs                They were here,

from the thin                                 they were silent,

and polished reeds                        they are gone, having tasted

at the edge                                    sheer terror.

of the silky world                         Therefore I have invented words

of water.                                       with which to stand back

Then,                                            on the weedy shore--

in their last inch of time               with which to say:

they see,                                       Look!  Look!

for an instant,                               What is this dark death

the white froth                             that opens

of her shoulders                           like a white door?

Oliver is a master at finding profound meaning in tiny moments.  The tiny moment in question this time is an egret feeding on fish and frogs in the shallows of a pond.  In Oliver's hands/words, this moment becomes a meditation on terror and death.  I can almost hear the echo of Matthew 24:  "Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect."  

The egret is coming at an hour you do not expect.

I took today off work.  Not only that, I also took a two-hour nap this afternoon.  As most of my faithful disciples know, I don't frequently have "free" time (is time ever free?).  I purposely didn't respond to texts, didn't check emails, and only answered phone calls and messages from close family and friends.  To use a buzzword that I sort of loathe, I completely disengaged.

Now, I didn't simply sit on my couch and ignore the world, obviously.  I had dinner and watched a movie with my kids.  Went for a couple walks with my puppy.  Edited and released an episode of my podcast Lit for Christmas.  Now, I'm writing my daily blog post.  So, disengagement is a relative thing, I suppose.  Basically, I only did things that I wanted to do.  Things that gave me pleasure and satisfaction.

This year, I've been starting every one of my days the same way:  I read a Mary Oliver poem.  This morning, it was "The Egret."  This ritual allows me to meditate on the poem du jour for a good length of time, to help me find my Mary moment, even when I'm trying to avoid my normal stresses and struggles.

Today, I found myself thinking about something my sister, Sally, taught me.  At the end of my life, I'm never going to say to myself, "I wish I'd spent more time working."  Nope.  Work shouldn't be what defines me.  When I'm gone, I hope people will remember me as a loving and devoted husband, father, brother, son, and friend.  That's what's truly important.  Sally was a workaholic, and she died at a very young age without getting the chance to retire and enjoy her golden years, if golden years even exist.  So, her message seems even more cautionary and urgent now.

It was the first day of September.  Blue and brilliant and warm.  On one of my walks, I saw that my neighbor's apple tree was dropping its fruit.  Autumn is around the corner, and, especially in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, winter  is coming at an hour we do not expect.

So, I took advantage of today.  Rested.  Ate with my wife, son, and daughter.  Read some poetry.  Exercised.  Wrote.  Because the apples are falling, the egret is in the shallows, and winter will soon be breathing frost down our necks.

Saint Marty is now going to disengage from this post.

August 17: "I Found a Dead Fox," Feast Days, Resurrection

Mary Oliver communes with the dead . . . 

I Found a Dead Fox

by:  Mary Oliver

I found a dead fox                                    about foxes.

beside the gravel road,                             But what happened is this--

curled inside the big                                when I began,

iron wheel                                                when I crawled in

of an old tractor                                       through the honeysuckle

that has been standing,                            and lay down,

for years,                                                  curling my long spine

in the vines at the edge                            inside that cold wheel,

of the road.                                              and touched the dead fox,

I don't know                                            and looked out

what happened to it--                              into the wide fields,

when it came there                                  the fox

or why it lay down                                  vanished.

for good, settling                                    There was only myself

its narrow chin                                        and the world,

on the rusted rim                                     and it was I

of the iron wheel                                     who was leaving.

to look out                                               And what could I sing

over the fields,                                        then?

and that way died--                                 Oh, beautiful world!

but I know                                               I just lay there

this:  its posture--                                    and looked at it.

of looking,                                              And then it grew dark,

to the last possible moment,                   That day was done with.

back into the world--                              And then the stars stepped forth

made me want                                         and held up their appointed fires--

to sing something                                    those hot, hard

joyous and tender                                    watchmen of the night.

It's a strange impulse Oliver has, to lay down with the dead fox, curl herself around its body, touch its face.  To look out at the world, see what the fox saw in its last breathing moments.  The wide fields of the world.  Oliver's poem is a celebration really, a psalm, joyous and tender.

The Catholic Church celebrates the feast days of saints.  For example, today, August 17th, is the feast day of Saint Clare of the Cross Montefalco.  I'm not going to go into Clare's life or accomplishments.  The thing that is significant is that she died on August 17, 1308.  Feast days are basically death days.

The reason the Catholic Church honors saints on the days of their deaths is because it is in death these holy people finally entered into the glory of God.  I suppose that's somehow meant to inspire Christians.  Don't be afraid of dying because, when your heart stops and lungs go still, you finally get to see the face of the Divine.  

Every year, my dad would go through his calendar and write the birthdays and death days of family members.  I understood the need to write birthday reminders.  To buy presents or send cards.  However, death day reminders always creeped me out a little.  As if my dad was trying to resurrect, every year, the loss and attendant grief.  He created feast days for his dead.

As I've gotten older, I've begun to understand why my father did this.  It's all about keeping the candle of someone's memory burning, making sure it doesn't fade into oblivion.  Think about it.  When you visit a cemetery, you're surrounded by stones bearing the names of the dead.  If you speak one of those names, give it breath, for those few seconds, that person is resurrected.  Alive again.

In two days' time, it will be the eighth feast day for my sister Sally.  Two days beyond that, it will be the first feast day for my good friend Helen.  I type their names here, say them aloud.  Give them breath again.  The sting of grief is still with me.  I feel their absences like missing teeth that my tongue keeps trying to find.

I'm not wallowing.  I'm remembering.  Resurrecting.  Think of it as poetic CPR.

Here are the names of Saint Marty's dead:  Sally and Helen.  Put them on your tongue.  Say them, like a prayer or incantation.  A bright sun in the belly of clouds.

January 29: "Bazougey," Joy, Forever Gifts

Mary Oliver writes about the deepest sting . . . 

Bazougey

by:  Mary Oliver

Where goes he now, that dark little dog

     who used to come down the road barking and shining?

He's gone now, from the world of particulars,

     the singular, the visible.

So, that deepest sting:  sorrow.  Still,

     is he gone from us entirely, or is he

a part of that other world, everywhere?

Come with me into the woods where spring is

     advancing, as it does, no matter what,

not being singular or particular, but one

     of the forever gifts, and certainly visible.

See how the violets are opening, and the leaves

      unfolding, the streams gleaming and the birds

     singing.  What does it make you think of?

His shining curls, his honest eyes, his

     beautiful barking.

Sorrow is a part of life.  That's what Oliver is getting at.  If you have happiness, you will eventually have sorrow.  Now, you can go around, trying to avoid sorrow.  Stay home.  Don't take any chances.  Of course, that means that you may never experience true joy.  Never find true happiness.

I know I've said all this in previous posts.  Joy and sorrow are two sides of the same coin, like light and dark, fear and courage, Donald Trump and sanity.  You can't have one without the other.  They sort of define each other.  (Okay, I think we could have all done without Donald Trump, but you get the idea.)

I know what you're thinking right now:  "Oh, no, Saint Marty's going to get all maudlin and depressing again about losing his sisters and brother and parents."  Sure, I could go down that road.  That's what you're expecting.

I'm not going to do that.  I'm going to focus on the other side of the coin:  joy.  I've just recovered from COVID.  My children are healthy and happy.  I have a partner I love and who loves me.  My dog is the cutest dog in the world.  I'm working a job I love.  Actually, several jobs that I love.  There's no snowstorm or blizzard on the horizon.  And, tomorrow night, I get to celebrate the life and poetry of one of my best friends.

This evening, my book club was supposed to meet at my house for our monthly dinner and discussion.  Because I have just recovered from COVID, we met via Zoom instead.  One member has described our book club as "the strangest book club in the world."  We have been going strong for close to 20 years.  Members have come.  Members have gone.  My mother was one of the inaugural members.  My sister, Sally, was a member, too.  (She never read the books.  She came to babysit my daughter, and then my son, while the rest of us talked and ate.)

Every time we get together now, I think of the people who aren't there any more.  At the moment, we are a small group.  But we love each other deeply.  We are family,  (Cue the disco music.)  So, tonight was joy.  Sally was there.  My mother was there.  All of our friends who've moved away were there.  Another of the current members once told a friend of hers, "I'm not allowed to leave book club.  Ever."  

Tonight, Saint Marty celebrates the forever gifts of his life--poetry, friends, family, and books that bring that bring us all together.

August 19: Fourth Anniversary, Sally, Heart Breaks a Little

Today is the fourth anniversary of my sister Sally's death.

Hard to believe that it was only four years ago.  So much has changed since she's been gone.  Still miss her daily.  Her no-nonsense approach.  How, when she thought I was being stupid, she would look at me over her reading glasses, her eyes saying it all:  "Bullshit."

I miss her generosity of spirit.  She dug my family out of quite a few holes when we needed it the most.  Her love came with no strings.  She gave and never expected anything in return.  Maybe that's why everyone loved her so much.

So, for today, I present a poem I wrote earlier this summer for her.

I miss you, Sal.  I love you.  I wish you were here.  I know you're still looking out for me and my family, the way you always did.

Saint Marty heart always breaks a little on this day.

Vigil Strange I Kept in Ann Arbor One Morning

by:  Martin Achatz

I sat by the bed railings, listened to you breathe.

Not the watery gasps of two weeks later, but breaths doing

the work they were meant to do, carrying oxygen to organs,

limbs, pink fingernails, fissured lips, to your damaged

and damaging brain where your voice nestled between

tumors, walled up against the apocalypse of your body.

I sat.  Held your hand.  Made small talk about the humid air

of Ann Arbor, school and work, because I couldn’t bring myself

to make big talk about goodbyes or letting go.  No, I talked to you

the way I talked when we used to eat lunch together, the smells

of vinaigrette and flax seed and bananas around us.  Everyday talk,

because I wasn’t ready for last day talk.

I told you about the film classes I would teach in the fall, listed

the movies we would watch.  Charlie Chaplin’s City Lights,

Singin’ in the Rain, Citizen Kane.  I sang a song to you,

the one Gene Kelly sings to Debbie Reynolds.  You’re my lucky

star.  I saw you from afar.  I got the words wrong.

I vigiled there for an hour, while your body went about the business

of closing up shop.  Never once did I say “I love you” or “I’m sorry for”

or “Don’t go.”  Instead, I talked about Charles Foster Kane and his sled.

Rosebud burning in the furnace at the end, crackling, peeling, ashing.

And, in those last minutes before the official acts of hospice and dying

took over, I asked you one question--“Do you want some ice?”--and you grunted

at me.  I placed a cube on your chapped tongue and watched it melt

down your chin.

August 19: Facebook Memory, Classic Saint Marty, "Emmaus"

This morning, when I woke up, Facebook had sent me a memory:  a picture of my sister who died three years ago on this day.  It took me by surprise.  In the back of my head, I knew it was the anniversary of her passing, but I wasn't prepared to see her face smiling at me from my phone.

I just got back from visiting the cemetery with my daughter.  It's been a long, warm, sad day.  I've spent most of it mowing grass.  In an hour or so, dinner at my parents' house.

Today's Classic Saint Marty is from three years ago . . .

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.

Loss never gets easier.  It gets more distant, until days like today, when it becomes fresh again, like grass that's just been cut, bleeding the smell of green into the air.

A poem for today . . .

Emmaus

by:  Martin Achatz

My sister lies in her bed
while her neighbors scream
in the hallway outside her door.
My sock, something’s wrong
with my sock, moans one voice.
And, Give it back, give it back now,
begs another, so full of longing
that I want to find its owner,
reach into my pants pocket,
empty its contents into
the speaker’s hands, hope
that, among the five quarters,
scrap of paper with a phone number,
burned-out Christmas bulb,
Tootsie Roll wrapper, maybe,
just maybe, he may find
what he’s lost.  My sister
has grown deaf to these voices.
She grips her bedrails,
grimaces, pulls herself closer
to me, the effot making her
shake as if some fist
is pounding on the door of her
body.  Do you want a drink?
I ask.  No, she says.
Are you warm enough? I ask.
She nods, closes her eyes.
Should I change the channel?
I ask.  No, she says again.
Then silence as she drifts
like a vagrant kite on a windy
day.  I wonder if she dreams
her body whole, climbs through
the window of her room, begins
walking down the road, between
the snowbanks, under the moon.
Maybe she meets other people
who tell her about the things
they can’t find.  Socks.  Cocker spaniels.
Birthday cards.  Wives.  Poems.
Husbands.  Photographs.  Friends.
The road is crowded with loss.
But they all keep moving, like pilgrims
on some cold Easter morning, hoping
to meet the one who will have
directions, will know how to get home.

March 8: Drove One, International Women's Day, My Sister

"Blood brother," said a message written in pink paint on the side of a shattered grocery store.

There was a tap on Billy's car window.  A black man was out there.  He wanted to talk about something.  The light had changed.  Billy did the simplest thing.  He drove on.

Billy Pilgrim, in the middle of a ghetto days after a race riot, is confronted by a black man at a stoplight.  The man isn't being angry or violent.  He isn't trying to drag Billy from his car to pelt him with bricks.  The man simply taps on Billy's window.

Now, Billy could roll down his window to see what the man wants.  Certainly, there is the possibility that the man could spit on Billy or throw dog shit in his face.  He could scream at Billy, call him a racist or fascist or Republican asshole.  Or the man may just ask Billy for directions to the nearest gas station.  Billy isn't willing to take any chances, though.  As Vonnegut writes, Billy does the "simplest thing."  When the light turns green, Billy puts his foot on the accelerator and drives on.

That's the story of most injustices in the world.  The people who could actually make a difference--those is power--choose to look the other way.  Ignore.  Drive in the opposite direction.  They choose not to roll down their car windows and listen.

Today is International Women's Day.  The theme for 2017 is "Be Bold for Change."  March 8 has been set aside to honor and draw attention to working women (and women, in general) all over the world.  Being a white working male, I lack firsthand knowledge of gender discrimination.  But I do know that, when my sister obtained her Master Plumber's license, she was one of only three women in the state of Michigan to hold that title.  My 16-year-old daughter is frequently confronted at school and called names for speaking up in support of Planned Parenthood and women's rights.

My sister, Sally, was one of the smartest and most accomplished persons I've ever known.  She single-handedly oversaw the planning, construction, licensing, and running of an outpatient surgery center.  She could read manuals for computers and medical equipment just ONCE and have those manuals memorized.  She treated all of her employees with respect and understanding.  My best friend, who worked as a surgical nurse for my sister, tells me all the time, "She was the best boss I will ever have."

I don't think my sister ever thought of herself as anything special.  She just did her job, worked long hours, and loved the people in her life.  But Sally would never look the other way if she saw some injustice in the world. 

Tonight, on International Women's Day, Saint Marty gives thanks for his big sister.

November 23: Holiday Ghosts, Miller Williams, "A Tenth Anniversary Photograph, 1952"

I think back around the holidays.  To Thanksgivings past, Christmases past.  Those times always seem to be sweeter, happier, warmer.  Sometimes, it's because of the people I've lost.   Other times, it's the yearning for something youthful--my infant daughter or son.  My mother used to be the general of the holidays, cooking the turkeys and hams, kneading the breads, dropping the oranges into the Jell-O, cutting out the cookies.  These days, she doesn't remember what day it is.

This morning, I was thinking about my sister, Sally.  She died last August.  Sitting at my desk at work, I actually found myself wanting to hear her voice.  It wasn't just a passing thought.  It was something physical.  Deep inside my chest.  It hurt.

Charles Dickens was right.  There are ghosts all around us this time of year.

Saint Marty isn't sad.  Just a little haunted.

A Tenth Anniversary Photograph, 1952

by:  Miller Williams

Look at their faces. You know it all.

They married the week he left for the war.

Both are gentle, intelligent people,

as all four of their parents were.

They’ve never talked about much

except the children. They love each other

but never wondered why they married

or had the kids or stayed together.

It wasn’t because they knew the answers.

They had never heard the questions

that twisted through the jokes to come

of Moses and the Ten Suggestions.

They paid their debts and never doubted

God rewarded faith and virtue

or when you got out of line

had big and little ways to hurt you.

People walked alone in parks.

Children slept in their yards at night.

Most every man had a paying job,

and black was black and white was white.

Would you go back? Say that you can,

that all it takes is a wave and a wink

and there you are. So what do you do?

The question is crueler than you think.

March 2: Mrs. Mildred Sink, Telling Stories, Matthew Gavin Frank, "Kepler's Last Law"

One day I was talking about snakes to Mrs. Mildred Sink, who operates a switchboard.  A large pane separated us, and we were talking through a circular hole in the glass.  She was seated in a dark room little bigger than a booth.  As we talked, red lights on her desk would flash.  She would glance at them, then back at me, and, finishing her point with careful calmness, she would fix on me a long, significant look to hold my attention while her hand expertly sought the button and pushed it.  In this way she handled incoming calls and told me her snake story.

When she was a girl, she lived in the country just north of here.  She had a brother four years old.  One bright summer day her brother and her mother were sitting quietly in the big room of the log cabin.  Her mother had her sewing in her lap and was bent over it in concentration.  The little boy was playing with wooden blocks on the floor.  "Ma," he said, "I saw a snake."  "Where?"  "Down by the spring."  The woman stitched the hem of a cotton dress, gathering the material with her needle and drawing it smooth with her hand.  The little boy piled his blocks carefully, this way and that.  After a while he said, "Ma, it's too dark in here.  I can't see."  She looked up and the boy's leg was swollen up as big around as his body.

Mrs. Sink nodded at me emphatically and then heeded the flashing light on the panel before her.  She turned away; this caller was taking time.  I waved and caught her eye; she waved, and I left.

Yes, I know that's a incredibly long passage.  But the story is so good.  The way that Dillard sets it up, talking with Mrs. Sink through a hole in a window.  The tale of the snake, starting so innocently and ending with that image:  the four-year-old boy dying in front of his mother.  (Make no mistake--the boy died.)  It's thrilling and terrifying to read at the same time.  And then Mrs. Sink just goes back to the switchboard.

I love a good story.  Right now, I am sitting in my office at the university.  It is spring break, so I believe that I'm probably the only person in the English Department.  It's almost 7 p.m.  I have been here about an hour and a half, doing work for the online class I'm taking.  (The instructor of the class told me the class would take about five hours per week.  I think I spent five hours just doing the week's readings.  This is going be a loooooong class.)

Whenever I'm in the English Department in the evening, I think of my friend, Ray, who used to the be the Department Head.  You may remember that Ray died of a massive heart attack the night before Thanksgiving in 2014.  Well, he's on my mind a lot when I'm sitting in my office.  For many people, Ray was the English Department.  A generous, funny, fair man.  He loved this place.

And thinking of Ray makes me think of my sister, Sally, who passed away in August, 2015.  I miss both of these people a great deal.  Ray was a part of my life for almost 25 years.  Sal wasn't just my sister.  She was my boss for 17 years.  Ten hours a day, we were together.  I sometimes still expect to see her car parked in its normal spot when I go to work.  She always parked in the same place.

I remember the first day I went to work after my sister died.  I was standing by a window, staring out into the parking lot, and I swear I saw my sister walking in the distance, wearing her blue hoodie and blue scrubs.  I looked once, looked away.  When I looked back, she was gone.

The first night that I was in my office at the university after Ray died, I was absorbed in some task at my desk.  The lights in the English Department are motion-activated.  After about ten minutes of inactivity, they turn off.  The hallway that night had been dark for quite some time.  As I was sitting at my desk, I felt like somebody was standing by my office door.  I looked up.  Nobody was there.  Suddenly, the hallway lights went on.  I got up and walked to my door.  Nobody was in the hallway.

You may be wondering why I'm telling you these stories.  Snakes.  Death.  Ghosts.  Well, first, I like telling stories about my friend and my sister.  It makes me feel like they're still with me in a way.  Second, I've been a little melancholy this afternoon, thinking about where I am right now in my life.  Third, I'm procrastinating about grading some papers.  The longer I make this post, the longer I can put off picking up my red pen.

The light just went out in the hallway of the English Department,  It's a little after seven in the evening now.  I'm sure the sun has set, and the cold night is getting colder. 

Saint Marty can no longer avoid the inevitable end of this post, except with a poem...

Kepler's Last Law

by:  Matthew Gavin Frank

The gargoyles with their frosted hair
guard the entrance to the library.

They are brother and sister, coffee-
stained, their muscular necks, things

under which teenagers still kiss
reading up with flapping fingers

to write their names.  From below,
my sister tells me, a fang is only

a small circle, a picture of the sun
in the central color pages

of a children's book about astronomy--
the one my mother bought me,

my seventh birthday, hoping
I wold go into the sciences,

unearth the skull of some Midwestern
dinosaur, polish it like a pearl.

Tell her that, in every cornfield,
is an ellipse that cries when it moos.

This is, after all, a law
of conservation, the orbit of her hand

as she bakes mandelbrot with chocolate chips
for the holidays, the finished scones

cooling on a sheet pan subject
to the hard gravitation

of room temperature.  Their smoke
loses itself in the space of a yellow

chandelier, the small extinction
of heat.  My sister,

angry after I dropped her
dollhouse family down the bathroom sink,

burned my book in the snow,
the chapter on Mars having outlasted

the fattest of the Jovians, the unspeakable
cold of the milk.  I knew even then

that she changed my life,
that my heart was not a good one--

a silk handkerchief, a bony
hand--an argument with genetics

I could not win, my body
stubbornly Aristotelian, still believing that it,

like the Earth used to be, was a fulcrum.
(Kepler knows:  here, an eraser is hard

to come by).
This pressure on my throat,

tightening now as I turn my back
on food, pass into pages, must be

my daughter, unborn, writing her name
on my breath.

Somewhere, in warm, warm, kitchens . . .

The hardest thing the Earth asks of us,
with its smells of white flour, requires

not the tractor, but remembering.

Yes, another weird cartoon to laugh at . . .