Another day, another bit of reno work, another hour or so slipped from the toolbox of days until we have to be ready. And another memorial service that I'm likely going to miss tonight. This one wasn't a long kiss goodbye that anyone saw coming - it was a short sudden flight that leaves only questions in it's wake, and a silence that weighs down the emotional barometer. Sudden shower, chance of migraine, an atmospheric block in the form of a cut of low. Suicides are like that.

They also seem to change the pattern of the grieving process, throwing the most gifted and skilled navigators of loss into unfamiliar, shocking territory. Anything can and should go. I know one family that went ahead and kept the mothers day reservation at the restaurant of her choice, place set and food ordered, urn of ashes beside the fork. Hell with what anyone else at the establishment thought and it worked for them. When someone changes the rules of passing, when their pain outstripped their ability to cope and depression insulates them from joy or compassion, leading them to what is often a very selfish act - the rules of grieving are set on edge for those left behind. It's not so well laid out or talked about, it's something we should be able to see coming and intervene all hero like, five minutes to the triumphant close, role credits. We should all over ourselves and may hallucinate points of the past that qualify as signs. But sometimes, we're human - they're human - and the act is an unavoidable, empty surprise.

Trying to find a memorial poem for a suicide, what I've come up with are individual poems meant for individual people, each grieving circle of family and friends finding their own way on an isolated journey. No stopping clocks or softly walking or defiance of death and sleeping. Simply "we miss you" and "why" and "forgive" and "you bastard".

I did find one - not specifically a universal memorial poem for suicides, but given that Sylvia Plath also took the short cut home, it kind of fits the mind set:

Now the washed sheets fly in the sun,
The pillow cases are sweetening.

It is a blessing, it is a blessing:
The long coffin of soap colored oak,

The curious bearers and the raw date
Engraving itself with marvelous calm.

Perhaps not the grieving person, but the understanding of what the suicide might have felt. When we can't catch and stop them, can't save them and the soul already slips, perhaps it becomes a point of learning to respect a choice we wouldn't make ourselves and can't and never want to comprehend. Too soon for that, I think, I kept looking and found some song lyrics that serve for me. A friend wrote them and I listened and transcribed, failing at a word or two I think so very sorry Timothy (see right of screen) and also thank you. From his song "Summer Wine":

Autumn came and it stole away the sun
The forest red behind
The thread you pulled, the fabric comes undone
You had October in your eyes
Under the sunset trees, you're tangled in the leaves

And we were so high, that we raised a flowing cup
But you drank it dry, and now the bottles used up.
Finished off the summer wine, must have been fools at the time.

Morning came and it drove away the night
Sent the stars to sleep
Woke the world with grace and the light
You had a highway in your heart
Coffee and an early road, in the room already lost to sight.

And we were so high, and we passed the bottle round
But you drank it dry, and you left without a sound.
Finished off the summer wine, must have been fools at the time.

Weeks ago when I missed June Callwoods memorial due to obligations I walked about 2K home instead, a march of one, bearing tulips to plant. Fucking squirrels ate them but no matter, I felt better. Today I think my memorial act will be in scraping paint from windows - it may sound trivial, but comforting to let in a little light right now.