There is a lesson in loss. When you see someone leave you. See them close their eyes for the last time. The delicate wisp of their Spirit rises up into the air, and you are left with the rent in your life where their beauty used to be. The shock of it leaves you numb at first. All feeling in your body suspended for a while as the enormity of the loss leaves your senses aghast. The shock slides over you. The deep oceanic pressure of it leaving you breathless. Bearing down on you as your mind struggles to pull together and mend the gaps they have left in your routine. But it cannot. How can this be? How can you make sense of something so final, so irreversible, so illogical. Present one moment and so completely gone the next. Then the tsunami of terror barrels down on your lungs. You cannot breathe. It’s hard to move. They are gone. Utterly gone. This is no mistake. No joke. What now..
Then comes the anger. White hot rage, snarling lips, and torrid accusations. How can this be? How can this be? Why am I so powerless. I don’t want this. I don’t want this at all. Why can’t I bring back the one that was taken away. Why didn’t they fight to stay. Why did they decide to leave. Why is life so cruel as to give and open your heart to another, only to snatch them away when their time is up. Why them and not me. This isn’t right. It’s not fair. How can this be?
Then comes the sadness. Rolling waves of grief, one after the other, as you walk through the ripples of their absence in your life. Things they used to do. Phrases they used to say. Food they liked to eat. The feel of skin. The warmth of arms around your back. Their eyes. Their smile. The spark of their existence that touched every part of your being. Now you are alone, and it cannot be undone. All you are left with are memories. In panic you try to preserve them all. The manic desire to sustain the gossamer threads between you and your loved one depend on the things you can see and touch.
Finally, the sadness retreats, and the shape of the loss sits just over your shoulder. Casting a delicate shadow on all that you do and everywhere that you go. It darkens every encounter with the people you meet. Keeping you gently captive so that you hold back from fully opening up to life again. You have been hurt once before. You know how this goes. There are lessons in losing the ones you love. You do what you can to survive. Dedicate your life to causes. Seek solace in other arms. Distract yourself with adventures and projects in their name. But the loss is always there. Waiting for you when the darkness falls. Such minor things bring the realisation back that they are gone. A flash of their favourite colour. A pebble on the beach. The smell of freshly brewed coffee. You are stronger now, but the scars they have left still ache. There are lessons in loss. You have learned them all. But the question remains in your Soul – How can this be? How can this be? And Life answers back – It is so.