black & white

In my dream, he has a red coat.

In my dream, he has a red coat. A red coat, and a striped scarf, and tiny black mittens and tall green boots.

I lift him out of his car seat, and he cheers and wraps his arms around my neck. He is big enough to walk, but I love the smell of him, love the way he rests his cheek ever so briefly on my shoulder, love how his hand wanders into my hair, despite the mittens. And so I carry him. Because I can.

It is cold here. Our breath leaves us as wispy white ghosts, making us giggle. We whisper together excitedly as we walk up to the apartment, and knock, and wait to be let in. My brother whips open the door and we are welcomed with that enveloping enthusiasm that never ceases to startle and amaze and comfort me. My brother is all enthusiasm, all quick movement and noise and taking up space and I absolutely adore him for it. Noah hides his face, feigning shyness--but we all know better. Soon enough he is laughing and playing and running around with R, and they are ridiculously cute together, and it is good, it is so, so good, and we are happy.

We are so ridiculously happy.

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Sometimes I wonder if this is happening, right now, in some alternate universe. I hope it is happening. I hope it happens again and again and again. I hope there is a place where my baby is alive. Live, baby! Live, my darling. Live and be happy. Play with your cousin and grow and live and be happy.

And you too, other me. I hope you can live, and be happy. Just like in my dreams.

raw

My consciousness streams like comets, like meteors. Streams like rivers running madly, racing to the sea. It could be like this all the time; this free flow of thoughts. This sea of ideas. But I am surrounded by sluices and dams, all meticulously handmade... I'm terrified of drowning, you see.

A seamless transition.

That's what we all hope for, isn't it. But does it ever really happen? Is it even possible? I don't know. I think it might be a thing we made up.

I feel like every change I've ever made has been wrenching, like ripping off a band aid--only not done and over then, quickly, like they say it will be, but awful and messy and the sting doesn't fade, it just gets overwritten eventually, maybe, by a new kind of sting that isn't any better, just different.

It is so abrupt, this wide world. Blatant. Blatantly kind; blatantly cruel. Lacking in subtleties.

Oh, subtlety.

How I long for quiet details, rather than this vast, raw experience I've had. Raw like meat. Raw like bones exposed. Raw like animals in the winter in the wild, cold, ravening, merciless. Harsh.

Weeks, months, years. My baby is dead, dead! And it guts me still, in the same beautiful, haunting way it always has and always will, except that my breaths get bigger, now, instead of smaller, and I am so excruciatingly alive I can hardly stand it. I want to cry and sing. Laugh and scream. Shake my fist at the falling sky. Dance. Dance. Dance.

I am alive.

Last night I dreamed I was pregnant, heavily so, and happy. Near the end of the dream, I thought my water broke, but I wasn't sure, because I'd never felt it before. It made me sad, in the dream. I didn't know what to do next, and I was so sad. I felt like less than the other mothers, the ones who had done this before. I felt that I should know.

I was still sad, when I woke up, still unsure.

There is indescribable pain radiating outward from behind my right shoulder blade, as if there were a massive hook through and through my flesh. (It's happened before, right there, though I couldn't tell you why.) I've been almost totally incapacitated for two whole days. Disheartening. I try to breathe into it, but it's deep deep down and it's boiling lava hot and it hurts-hurts-hurts-hurts-hurts, and I'd rather just lie as still as I can, and pretend it's not there.

Story of my life.

Oh god, it hurts. All of it hurts.

But I am fierce, and clever, and strong, and no one has completely gotten the best of me yet.