why I don't write anymore

They say that when you have a child, it's like having your heart walk around outside your body. 
When you lose a child, you lose your heart. 
I have always wanted to write, at least since I was 11 or so, and I have always resorted to writing in my most difficult moments.  Writing a book about my son's death seemed the only true thing I could do, and I pushed through the pain, because he was worth it.  But now that the wound has scarred over, it seems worthless to reopen it.  It's not that the pain is gone, but it seems like there is no one left to feel it.  There are still the moments of terror, when I'm falling asleep and it all comes to me so clearly that it seems impossible to fall into the forgetfulness of sleep.  But I have to believe I can, for the sake of sanity, fall asleep.  Otherwise I would have to end my consciousness some other way.  And when you do that enough - when you push back those thoughts in order to regain your peace of mind, then you are no longer you.  You are just a zombie living out your days.  And that is what I am, and why I can't write anymore.

Achilles absent was Achilles still

That quote figured repeatedly in his posts.  And I have used it to evoke him.  I just realized why he identified with Achilles.  He broke his heel.  Literally.  When he jumped out of a window.

poem

your lack,
the void you left
what am I if not your mother
the world is devoid of tragedy now
I can leave at any time and it will not be tragic
but I stay, to feel the void
all that is left of you - an emptiness in the shape of me

how to survive when you don't want to

This is how you do it: you empty yourself of desire.  Any desire leads to longing, longing leads to regret. 
You become the pain.  You know when it comes.  You know that breathing deep can ease it, but you don't.  You clamp down on it, let it wash through you.  You become it.  You don't avoid it. This is you now, this vessel for pain.  Anything else is a delusion.

life as suffering

When I was little I was grateful that I was born after the wars had ended (little did I know that wars never end) and 20 years since the last world war seemed a long time, indeed - a nice buffer for me from all that suffering.  I thought that no matter what happens to me, it can't be that bad.  Then I heard of accidents - car crashes and the like, and freedom from suffering became a little less certain, but still I felt impervious.  If only I did my best, I thought things would likely turn out alright.  What I didn't realize is that things never 'turn out' alright. It just depends where you end the story - isn't that the cliche about happy endings?  Because in the end it's never alright.  My mother's death taught me that.  Things are alright until they're not anymore. 

What I still don't understand is how I'm supposed to continue in the face of things never being alright again.  How much suffering can I take.  Last night, as I lay in bed my heart literally hurt, or at least the left side of my chest.  And it's like this every night, and every time I wake up, and in the middle of the day, when my mind can't be distracted and now it comes with hot flashes, not just spasms in my core.  But it's not the physical pain I mind - I could probably seek redress for that, and it's not the lack of a happy ending - I know there is none.  It's the why go on like this that boggles my mind.

enough said

the only surviving self-recording of my son