Fuck you, you win

Yes, fuck you, you win.

Maybe, or surely, I deserve it. Why have the small consolation of a victory when my babies are gone?

Just give me the final mercy.

To my gone babies: days full of love

My dearest babies,

You are all gone now, but everyday I had with you was a day full of love. I had many failings, and there were times when I lost my temper. But there was never a day that I didn't love you, and there was never a day that I wished something or someone other than you. You were life, you were love, you were loved--as you are now, even though you are no longer here.

That love exists now only in memory, in the pain that I feel over your loss, in quiet lamentations over lives lost and love cut short because your lives were all too short.

The pain creeps in sometimes. Most of the time it just hits me. My babies are gone. My Boobie, my Almond, my Vixen. All gone. 

I had wished, like every parent, that you would outlive me. But our life spans were different. But I wished all the same, each day spent in love, yet each day spent in fear--of losing you, of living a life without you.

That fear is reality now. From a life filled with days of love, I live one I can barely understand. This is life now, without you.

God and August nights

On a night in August, many years ago, I stood on the third floor of a retreat house on a hill in Angono. I had fallen in love. I looked down on the lights of the town, and I said a prayer, over and over, over a glass or two or three of scotch. Let me have this woman, and I will be happy. That prayer in the night, said to a god I know now does not exist, were "answered," if you believe in god. August was happy then.

One night in August, I watched a woman sleep. I had fallen in love. I clung to her voice, to her eyes, to her lips, her voice. "Let's be friends forever," she said. I see her face, her eyes, those lips, even now. One afternoon I looked into her eyes. One night I watched her doodle hearts on a pad. I wished to never go away. I walked away.

One night in August my baby died. I didn't know it then, but I cried. Something told me, somehow I knew. My baby is dying. The next morning I got the news: Garpy was dead.

One night in August told me "God" was good. All other August nights tell me "God" does not and simply cannot exist.

Garpy, December 29, 1982-August 10, 1991: Lovingly remembered on the anniversary of his death

My dearest Garpy

You are missed and remembered always.
You are loved now as you were loved then.

My dearest Garpy.

Getting harder, not easier

The days are getting harder, not easier.
Whoever said time heals didn't know squat.
It just gets harder, and the pain keeps coming back.
I am dead, yet I am not.
I want to drown in oblivion.
Oblivion, oblivion.
I am a prisoner to my cowardice.
I want to sleep and never wake.
At times I feel I'm coming to a point where I just won't care anymore.
It just hurts too much.
I wait.