I Wish I Had The Words

I wish I had the words to bring everyone back, to put the grief in the pit.
The words to reach through the phone and cut the rope before you hit the end of it.  Words to reach you, to encompass my regret.
For all my teaching and my preaching, in the dark moments my empathy was fleeting.

I still wake up weeping, wake up knowing you are forever sleeping, wake up knowing you took with you a piece of my heart.
I wake up knowing your family is whole again and it hurts; wake knowing my son is in your arms, when he was not a moment in my hand... and I still reach for yours in the dark, feel your voice in my heart.
I wish I had the words to go back to that day, the very last, you would know the one; the day after freedom, the day we won.
I wish I had had the words for that timid 3 AM dance, that crazy, insane chance... the last we ever had.

I wish I had a better story, but here's the catch, life is deplored.
One shot, two shots, three shots, four, one drunk driver and bad news knocks on your door.
One cell, two cell, four; well... it wasn't cancer, but I still weep, because my son would almost be four.
A one knot, two knot, three knot noose... and more tears on the loose.
Love and loss are not far apart, two letters and one heart.
Don't mock me if I take my pain and turn it into art, don't scoff at me if I fall apart, don't scream at me just because these words slid into your heart with a whisper to gut you with a scream.
I wish I had the words to make it go away; to make this life a dream.
But I don't have those words, I don't have the lies, and the pain of loss reminds me  I'm alive.
They remind me that I still have to fight, that I refuse to be a young funeral, that I refuse to let this world break me.
Even with my hands a-shaking, feet aching, bone pushed to the point near breaking, it will be progress that I am making.
I will be art, even if I must deconstruct, completely tear myself apart.

I wish I had the words to make believe in myself... but I don't.
Instead I have the junk drawer memories, things from here and there; they're not always pretty, not always fair.