June 3rd – delete- Chris Ritchey

Artwork Chris Ritchey

Hard weeks, when even writing is no  longer cathartic. Always months of anniversaries of this and that…. May  and June full of them. Some were happy  but in the dying times most are met with “wanting to  just get through” to  the other side. The “what if” things had turned out differently , “memories that should have been”  dissolved into  the murky waters of time  and reality  rippling out into  nothingness.

And yet the days of memories linger on the edge of our reality , the present.  As I wait for the pink rose  blossoms to  once again surround the fountain (you  purchased as my  “thank you “)  mingles with the memory  of you  carrying it piece by  piece that June day to  place it where it still sits- I  see you  the way  you  carried yourself, muscles taut  across your  back as the cast  concrete weighed upon those arms  recently  pumped with  chemo.

I see you  sitting on the edge of the pond slipping in the “Ghost Koi” that Mothers’ Day . The Koi that is now as long as my  fingertips to  my  elbow. He/she slips silently  through  the waters just a glimpse of the past melding with  the present. The reality  of missing you  and wanting to  see you , hear your voice, laughter to  make me smile through the grief that is always there  waiting…….

I can’t  “delete” those memories and the hundreds of them that assail with every  passing day. They hurt , even the very  good ones  but they  are you so  they  can be borne ….

I can and have deleted  people from my  mind  journey – the ones that have caused hurt, they  barely  exist in my  world except when I bring them to  the fore because they  are mentioned by others –  control , alt , delete . I can control those memories . It is if they  belong to  a different lifetime  and actually they  do  ….. they  are the purveyors of  wickedness personified , selfishness undiluted  and have no  room in the “what if”………

Another 3rd, another month  another year but you  are loved beyond all tears….