The Dance
I feel like I'm in a never ending waltz. I feel myself swaying to music that I hate. I step from a close realization, acceptance, then back into surrealness. Constantly moving between the real, new life shadowed by loss and the unwillingness to believe I'm actually living this life.
Sometimes I can hear my baby in my head. He used to say the funniest things. I find myself laughing and searching for his sweet face in my mind. I pretend that he's just in the other room. Still alive, still funny, still there. Then I find myself searching room to room, ending up back in my dance. I shift from reluctant-resolve, to life with purpose, back to the bone shattering pain of being a mother to a dead child.
I feel the rhythm of the silent music screeching its painful tune. The awful music pulls me and pushes me along the dance floor. Back and forth, a never ending cycle of pain to purpose and back again. The force of the horrific tune is too strong to fight. I feel myself being lead in circles. Around and around forever, in a cycle of anguish and hope.
The music is compelling. My body, heart and mind is pushed into the dance. The screeching sounds pull my soul into its rhythm, for which there is no way out. Grief spins around me in a graceful pirouette. Trauma spins circles around my brain. Loss leaps across my mind. A beautiful, agonizing show of all the love I have left to give.
I am forever stuck two-stepping. One step forward into peace and hope and opportunity. Two steps back into the searing pain of awareness. A beautiful ballet drenched in pain and suffering.
My pain is showcased, my despair is on display. My heart, beaming with hope, entwined with all the regret I have sways to the music of my grief. Oh how I wish I was dancing with my son, not just his memory. I long for the sound of the music of his life, untainted by the clanging of his death. I crave the beautiful tune of joy. I yearn for life that makes sense. I despise my dance, yet love it nonetheless. I twirl to the melody of pain and loss. I give into the waltz. I dance while I think of my son. I respect the movement, the twists and the turns. I learn to enjoy the sounds of beauty and prepare for the tunes of torment. I practice my dance so I'm not pushed and pulled against my will.
I learn to love my dance. It's all I have left.