Solitude

Tonight, the sky is inky black, murky. False hopes are built upon vague promises like wishes whispered to invisible stars, "We will meet again." There are no witnesses tonight. A couple goes to bed, hopeful to dream of Kitsch. The woman tosses in her sleep searching for a lost heartbeat. The man curls up into a fetal position, yearning for warmth. An arm reaches over to the other side--absence, the presence of space.

They find no comfort in a spacious bed shared with death.

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Atmospheric Disturbances 2

"People naturally perseverate on their personal tragedies, even though such perseveration doesn't really serve anyone, neither the living nor the dead...It's simply not a practical use of time to think constantly of the dead. I'm not heartless, and I do regret that I must sound that way, and I understand how resilience is in its way a demonic kind of strength, a strength that is discomforting evidence against the existence of true, eternal love. But is it better for the living to burn themselves in others' funeral pyres? As I wrote, once, "Mourning should be mortal." And, well, I think it's worth considering why memorial writing is so awful, why it so entirely fails to communicate the feeling of loss. I at least feel that it fails. Those vague earnest words all seem so demeaning, so shameful, like strangers hearing the sound of you going to the bathroom."

-Rivka Galchen, Atmospheric Distubances

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