Here on the ground, we need the bodies. We crave proof of life: a casket, an urn, a pyre, a grave, a place of rest. We collect shells, cling to the container, visit markers. We are desperate to hold evidence of existence in our bare hands. But you are missing, absorbed into air, disappeared, dissipated into sky, a memory untethered. You are reflected momentarily in a ray of light, a shape spotted in a cloud, floating in the scent of ash and smoke and dust. You are everywhere, but nowhere. There is no clear place to lay down flowers, no clear place to mourn. Here on the ground, we ache to see something, to touch something, anything: a bone, a boot, a shard, a rock, a fragment of you. In our grief, we need proof of death: something real, tangible, visible. We need a body of evidence, a door we can open and close in order to let you go.
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May they rest in peace.
Compassionate clarity and deeply moving. Thank you Suzanna.