Makalani: July 2020

I Am Darkness

Where were you last night? In bed, no doubt, or somewhere similar. Perhaps couch, chair, mat or earth cradled your weary head in dreamy, gentle hand. Brushed by breezes of slumber melodious, your eyelids drooped, wavered, and at last closed. But did you sleep? Ah, that is the question.

How do you know you slept? How do you know you did not sleep? Could you have slept and dreamed that you woke? Or laid awake and felt like it must have been a dream? Perhaps. The question is – did you sleep alone?

Lonely is the pillow unshared with another. Lonely is the couch that embraces but one. Lonely and heavy is the sleep of the single, for alone must they bear the weight of the night. Did you know that darkness is heavy? If you sleep alone, I think you do. If not – you once knew, even if you cannot remember now.

Did you know it takes strength to sleep alone? To wake from dreams however wonderful or terrible and find no one there to say “You’re awake now.” No one to solidify the burden of the darkness with gentle hand, voice or breath. Loneliness. This is what the darkness is made of. This is what bears you down into either dreams that feel like waking, or presses you beneath a waking which feels like a dream.

Now, loneliness is, in itself, not a bad thing. For the longest time I loved the lonely dark better for its sense of utter emptiness. The shades of night were to me like a balm for restless thoughts which soothed my mind into peaceful dreams. I was content in the lonely dark, until the accident happened.

Flashes of red, blue and white light and a sensation of utter numbness are all that I can remember. They say I almost died. They say I will never walk again. They say . . . they say many things, but I don’t listen as much as I used to. They’re not really there, the darkness has swallowed them whole. You see, that’s the one thing they say that I always hear. They say I am blind.

What to do with this perpetual darkness? Yes, I loved the night! But night without day is not beautiful – it is cold, empty and like a knife in the mind and heart that will never be removed.

At least, that’s what I thought. In the darkness, I thought many things. A few of them were hopeful, but most of them were sad. Darkness dominated my thinking until I found each breath harder to draw than the last. Each movement of the heart harder to contain. I longed to burst forth from this darkness and into a waking dawn. Then I had to remind myself – I will never see again.

It is strange how you never long for something so strongly as when you lose it. I remembered, through my darkness, the light of a fire. That tiny spark which started a flame to warm and light the shadows. Light gives shadows being. Without it, they are nothing. I used to like lighting fires. Striking that match and watching the spark lace its tendrils through wisps of old paper and dry grass. From spark it grew to taper and from taper to a flame. Then the flames would dance with the shadows, weaving and twirling them like breaths of twilight and dawning. People say that the moon and the sun dance. I don’t think so. I think the moon dances with the night and sun dances with the dawn. I liked the moon best, until I couldn’t see. And, now I can’t see, I can’t like either anymore.

Perpetual darkness has a way of cloaking sounds and echoing voices. I know my hearing was not marred – in fact, it has grown stronger. But since I stopped listening, everything has just faded into a numb background. Either the voices are too loud, or they’re so soft, I cannot hear them. At first the realization scared me – that I might be darkening my last link to the light by refusing to nourish it? But with that first fright the sounds returned. They were so hard and rough – like sandpaper filing through the brain – that I had to go back. I had to return to the darkness.

I remember this song I once heard. The beginning of it went something like this: “Hello darkness, my old friend. I’ve come to talk to you again.” I loved that song, if only for the first two sentences. It used to make me think of slipping into dark corners to tell stories, or sitting beside a campfire and watching as the ashes grew duller and duller until all the light vanished. Then I would talk to the darkness. Now? Well, now I don’t even talk. Darkness isn’t an old friend anymore – it’s me. I am darkness.

Forever.

And no matter what I do, I will always fall asleep in the loneliness of myself. Why does it have to be this way? I don’t know. I find it hard to even care anymore. This is darkness – the friend in me. Hello, darkness. Why am I talking to you again? Because you are my only friend.

My last friend.

The lonely me.

Where was I last night? In bed, I think.

In the dark – alone.

Raindrops in puddles and puddles in seas;

Gales are winds, and the wind is a breeze;

Raindrops and teardrops are sweet and sour;

Seeds and sprouts and buds that flower;

Letters makes words and words make stories

Stories are lives and lives are histories.

Sizes, shapes and times all move

And change forever. But not love.

~ N. T. Williamson

That was the last poem my Dad wrote, though he didn’t exactly finish it. When I found him at his desk, he still had the pen in his hand right after the word ‘But’ on that last line. After they took him away, I wrote the last two words. I’m pretty sure that’s what he meant to write, if he’d had the time . . .

It’s kinda scary how you can just be living your normal life one second, and then the next you realize you can’t see the road ahead of you anymore. My Dad was my light. He was the way I saw where to go and what to do. Now he’s gone. I don’t think I’ve really realized it yet.

My Dad was a poet and a writer. He said that someday, I might be one too. We used to write poems together and tell stories. When I found him, I was coming to show him a new poem I had started writing:

Tales are for telling

And stories can store

For decades and ages

And eons and more.

Myths are not missed

Nor fables forgot

For people love stories

----------------

After that, I couldn’t seem to figure out anything really good for the last line. I was hoping Dad could help me. I was not expecting to find him dead.

The doctors just told Grandma Alice something. Now she’s rolling down the hall in her wheelchair. I look up, but looking doesn’t mean I see anything. It’s all too white. Isn’t death supposed to be black? I don’t understand . . .

“Lina,” Grandma Alice says, taking my hand in her old, soft, wrinkled one. I nod slowly.

“He had a clot in his brain,” she says softly, “No pain.”

“Like falling asleep really fast,” I murmur.

“Yes, like that,” she says.

For a split-second all I want to do is break down in tears. I can feel them burning underneath my eye-lids, but the feeling goes away as fast as it came, and I forget that I am supposed to cry. I mean, my Dad just died. Isn’t crying like the next step? I’m not sure anymore.

I stand up, and stepping behind Grandma’s wheelchair, push it towards the door. Something just tells me we need to go home now. Not that home is home without Dad, but Benny and Jake haven’t had supper yet, and I was going to make mac’n’cheese.

“C’mon guys,” I say. Benny and Jake peel themselves off of the waiting bench and troop behind me to the door. We’re going to have to get a ride, since Grandma can’t drive and I’m not old enough yet.

Twenty minutes later, Mr. Alcott – our neighbor – brings the van and we all help Grandma inside.

The drive home seems to take a long time, even though we only live about ten miles from the hospital. Maybe time just gets slow when your brain won’t work – mine sure isn’t. Up in the passenger-side seat I am sitting; Grandma’s in the back with the boys. As if from really, really far away I can hear Jake sobbing and Benny sniffing. Grandma’s voice is harder to hear, but I think she’s saying something about how everything is going to be all right. Adults always say that.

All right. I can’t seem to think straight, so maybe I’ll just concentrate on that. Let’s see, ‘all’ would be us – Grandma, Jake, Benny and me. And then ‘right’ . . . is that supposed to mean not left? The thought makes me want to punch something. Stupid brain making jokes. ‘Right’ means ‘well’ or ‘great’ or even ‘best’. Everything’s going to be ‘all right’, translation: Everything is going to be us well. And ‘well’ means not to be sick, right?

But Dad was sick – that’s why he died. Oh, I know, it wasn’t like a really long cancer sick, or even just a heart-attack sick where you realize you’re dying just soon enough to say “Dear God, take care of my kids!” It was even faster than that. I’ll bet Dad didn’t even realize he was dying . . .

Why does that make me mad? I know he cared, but . . . no, I’m just mad because I’m a kid and I don’t get things like this so it scares me. Just forget about it. I don’t need to be mad, I need to be ‘right’. I need to be strong enough to help Grandma and the boys through this. Maybe I’ll cry someday.

I hope Dad isn’t crying up in Heaven. Dear God, make him happy, and tell him that I’m going to take care of the kids. There’s nothing to worry about. Everything’s going to be all right.

As I look out the front wind-shield and watch the raindrops slither up the glass like little clear worms, I remember Dad’s poem again. He was writing about raindrops when he died, wasn’t he?

No, that’s not right. He was using raindrops as a metaphor, but he was writing about something else.

Love. Dad loved to write about love. I think it’s because he had so much love for all of us. Love for Grandma, love for Jake, for Benny, for Mom before she died . . . for me. Dad loved me – I remember how much he loved to say that he loved me. He even wrote me a poem. I can’t remember it now, but I can remember the poem I wrote in response to his. It was the first poem I ever wrote – I must have been like four:

“Daddy, I love you

And you love me.

Daddy I love you

It makes me happy.

Daddy, I love you

And you love me too

Daddy, I love you

I love you, I love you.”

What? More raindrops? How did they get in the car? Down my face the hot little worms slither, some of them slipping into my mouth. They’re salty. Something shakes me, like when Dad would pick me up to give me a hug. Another shake. More salty raindrops.

“Daddy, I love you,” I whisper. I know it now – the raindrops are tears and these shakes are sobs. Why didn’t I cry when I lost him? Why am I crying because I love him? I love him, I love him, I love him . . .

“Daddy, I love you,” I whisper again. I wish I could have said it to him again before he died. I love him. Oh, Daddy, I love you so much.

“Daddy, I love you

But now it’s goodbye

Oh, Daddy, I love you

And it makes me cry.

Daddy, I love you

I miss you so much.

Daddy, I love you

I love you so much.”

I don’t realize I am singing it until Benny and Jake’s voices join in. Then Grandma’s. We’re all crying now.

All I can wonder is why death doesn’t hurt, but love does.

From Sea to Sea

Though she drank the Sea, yet would she thirst.
Between endless sky and boundless waters she lay, rolling with the swell on her raft of salt-crusted wood. Eyes closed and breathing slow, she tried to will her body into cooling down. High above, the sun cast rays like spears down into the water around her. Up from the shining silver face of the sea these spears glanced, arching to fall again on her lidded eyes. Each collision of light with nerves pounded in her head with an incessant, mindless drumming. Beat after beat, each swell of pain stole a little light from her mind, and then receded to make way for more.

From over the side of the raft her hands and legs trailed, relieving the bitter heat in a balm of equal bitterness. Dry salt crusted her limbs, hair and eyes. A few days ago she, in her desperation, had tried to drink the briny waters. Now, she was more thirsty than ever before.

Cooler than her sweat and saltier than her tears, the wave-run waters spread to every horizon. So much water, yet not for drinking! Would it ever end . . .

Ah, that was the question. Which would end first? The sea, or herself? She couldn’t know.

Through thick, dark lashes she watched as the sun began to sink lower in the sky. Hours passed, each one timed by the roll of a hundred waves. At last, the sun sank into the sea, first turning the waters fire-orange, then blood-red and then rosy-pink before it disappeared beneath the waves. For a long time, the heat lingered, bathing the darkness in a deliciously humid, tropical warmth.

Then that too vanished, and the cold of night began. Opening her eyes, she gazed upwards into a sea of stars. Faint they glimmered and high they turned as slowly the night wore on. The longer it went, the colder it became, until she was huddled in the center of her raft, gathering fistfuls of rags around her in a futile attempt to keep warm. Then a wind awoke. Catching up her long, black hair, and the blacker waves around her, it dashed little hails of water against the side of her raft. Over and over she was struck by these cruelly cold drops, until her soaked hair was plastered against her arms, face, back and neck. For what seemed like forever, she shivered, licking her lips when the salty drops dug their darts into the cracks in her skin. Always she longed for a cup of clear water.

In the East, the sky began turning gray. Then from gray it turned to pale-blue, at last giving way to the sun’s radiant gold. The waters began warming, the wind died down, and another day of deadly heat began.

So the cycle ran, as slowly her life drained into the salty waters beneath. She wondered if perhaps the sea was not mostly darkness because of all the lives it had taken – all the deaths it had wrought.

Ever she was tempted to forget the bitterness of the sea and quench her thirst in its endless waters. But no – she pulled her hands from the swell – she dare not drink that. Certainly, it was draining the life from her, but she would gain no life by draining it back.

Would the sea never end? Would she find land? Would she find water . . . sweet, drinkable water? She had almost give up all hope, until the fourth dawn broke.

At least, it should have broken. The sky had long since turned gray, blue and then gold, before she wondered why the sun’s rays were not striking her directly. Perhaps a cloud had obscured the horizon. Pushing herself up on one trembling arm, she looked out towards the East.

There, in the further distance, a great hump of darkness rose from the sea – like the shadow against a wall. She blinked, scrubbing the salt from around her eyes with equally salty hands. Could it be? Was this a cloud, land . . . or hallucination? Glancing down at her arms and legs, she saw no bright rays glancing off her deep brown skin. It could not be a mirage – for she felt no heat from the sun. But then how could it be a cloud? Clouds are not so thick and dense. It must be . . .

No – she shook her head – she would not dare to hope. Only wait, and assume it was nothing. That way, she couldn’t be disappointed. Turning her back to the shadow in the sky, she gazed down into the deep sea. And yet, no matter how many times she told herself that it was nothing, still her hands strayed over the raft’s sides, pushing a little water away as they floated. Pushing her towards the land.

It was not until sundown that she saw it again. Opening her eyes to watch the final warm rays recede, she started to see another dark shadow painted against what was now the Western horizon. Turning, she looked out over the sea behind her. No shadow. Turning back, she gazed wide-eyed at strip of land she had just floated by. Land, but now she was going away from it.

“No,” she whispered, her voice hoarse and breathy from lack of use.

“No, no come back,” she shook her head, eyes never leaving the receding shore.

Then – O salvation! – she sighted a ship putting out from the land! Great billows of sail filled with a breeze from the upper airs as the shadow galleon swept outward from the shadow shore. Swiftly, it sped along the horizon.

“Help,” she gasped, staggering to her feet. Her legs buckled, her raft tipped, and she fell into the sea.

She surfaced, thrusting frantically against the suffocating depths beneath.

“Please, help!” she screamed through mouthfuls of foaming water. As if in rage at her trespass, the sea began to boil and churn around her. Her raft was swept away, and she was carried out to sea.

“Help me! Plea-” she choked and cried, struggling to fight the overwhelming waves. She had to reach the ship! Or the land! Or something!

But she couldn’t see either now. Over her crashed wave after wave, obscuring the land and blinding her eyes with salt. It was not until night fell that the waters calmed again.

On her back she lay in the water, resting her pain-wracked limbs – trying to breathe calmly as the cold water around her sapped the life from her bones. No, no she was so close! The sea would not win . . .

“Breathe, breathe,” she whispered to herself, and tried to hum a tune – but she couldn’t remember any. At last, as if from the deeps below, a song rose to her mind which she knew had been sung before, but never to her:

“From sea to sea and land between

One is known, the other seen

Blues and greens are aquamarine

And it all ends in the Sea.

“From sea to sea and wrecks below

Countless ones you’ll never know

Gone into where you will go

For it all ends in the Sea.

“From sea to sea and rivers and streams

Carrying down the endless dreams

Into a cup that has no seams

Where they all end in the Sea.

“From sea to sea and ashes that fly

From the fires and through the sky

Borne on winds to founder and die

For they all end in the Sea.

“From sea to sea without a breath

Ripples and waves that sing of death

Carry each creature that wandereth

And end them in the sea.

“From sea to sea I now have come

My journey’s o’er – the battle’s done

I have not sought, yet found a home

My ending in the sea.”

So singing, she rode the swell, her body her raft, her beating heart, her final prayer. And as the night drew on, that heart beat slower and slower unto the dawn.

~ ~ ~

Across golden sand all streaked with cream and pink he walked, gazing out over a dawn-lit sea, and wondering what the next day would bring.

He had not gone far, before he found it.

“Good Lord,” he gasped, sprinting the few final yards and falling to his knees in the wet sand beside a dark, still form. Hesitantly, he touched her face, and finding it icy cold, gathered her wasted frame into his arms.

“Wake, lass, wake now,” he whispered, rubbing her hands and stroking her face. With a low moan, she stirred, and slowly her salt-crusted eyes cracked open.

“There y’are,” he murmured, smiling with relief into her sun-burnt face, “Ye’ll be set right soon.”

“W-w,” she struggled to speak.

“Ye want water?” he asked, already moving to lay her down.

She shook her head faintly, and lifting a trembling hand, pointed out Eastwards over the sea.

After a quizzically silent pause, he guessed her unspoken question.

“That’ll be the Inio Sea,” he said.

She pointed Westwards.

“And the Anio Sea,” he said.

As her eyes strayed back and forth between the two seas, they slowly closed. She heaved a sigh, that almost sounded like a laugh, though it was much sadder. Her hand which lay across his own, relaxed, slipped, and fell into the water at her side.

Gently, he heard a last murmur steal up from her parted lips:

“From sea to sea, and land between”

Makalani

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