Marie Howe writes about her brother . . .
For Three Days
by: Marie Howe
For three days now I’ve been trying to think of another word for gratitude
because my brother could have died and didn’t,
because for a week we stood in the intensive care unit trying not to imagine
how it would be then, afterwards.
My youngest brother, Andy, said: This is so weird. I don’t know if I’ll be
talking with John today or buying a pair of pants for his funeral.
And I hated him for saying it because it was true and seemed to tilt it,
because I had been writing his elegy in my head during the seven-hour drive
and trying not to. Thinking meant not thinking. It meant imagining
my brother surrounded by light—like Schrödinger’s Cat that would be dead
if you looked and might live if you didn’t. And then it got better, and then
it got worse, and it’s story now: He came back.
And I did, by that time, imagine him dead. And I did begin to write the other
story: how the crowd in the stifling church snapped to a tearful attention,
how my brother lived again, for a few minutes, through me.
And although I know I couldn’t help it, because fear has its own language
and its own story, because even grief provides a living remedy,
I can’t help but think of that woman who said to him whom she considered
her savior: If thou hadst been there my brother had not died, how she might
have practiced her speech, and how she too might have stood trembling,
unable to meet the eyes of the dear familiar figure stumbling from the cave
when the compassionate fist of God opened
and crushed her with gratitude and shame.
It’s a familiar story—Lazarus dying, Mary (his sister) getting pissed at Jesus, Jesus weeping, and Lazarus rising from the tomb. Howe’s brother is Lazarus in the ICU, dying, and Howe is Mary, waiting for a miracle to arrive.
Sometimes miracles are answers to desperate prayers--Please save the life of my brother. Other times, miracles are smaller, not even recognized as miracles--I had nachos for dinner tonight that were so good they tasted like grace. I've said it before, but it bears repeating: human beings are surrounded by miracles all day, every day, but we are simply miracle-blind from years of indifference and distraction.
Let me a share one of these little miracles that happened for me tonight . . .
About a week or so ago, my son applied for a job at the local Children's Museum. He made a resumé, dressed up, put his hair in a ponytail, and went to the interview. This evening, he told me that he got hired. He starts his training on Friday.
I am so proud of my son. First job interview results in his first job. At the end of a long, long day, this news was just the miracle I needed to lift my spirits.
Plus, Saint Marty wrote a new poem (another little miracle) . . .
On the Roof
Peter White Public Library
October 28, 2021
by: Martin Achatz
I imagine I'm standing inside
God's blue lung where gulls circle,
scream, and the waves swell & recede,
divine sighs full of fishy hope and
sadness. Not many people have access
to this place so close to heaven.
Maybe that's why, on this morning
after I trapped my mother's last breath
in my hands, felt it slap my palms
like a panicked sparrow, I climb
these steps, open my fingers, watch
that breath rise and rise and rise away
from this eggshell world.
