Chrysanthemum Silhouettes
Vermilion petals, shadows of a past that looms over the present and
leave traces of chrysanthemums on a grave. The sky wept that December afternoon
over those frozen tombstones covered with earth and solemnity. I remember the
day you left. You were in my arms when I saw your gaze begging for an end to
that torture that captivated your breath.
That December afternoon, among golden rays that crossed the distant horizon, I saw you pass placidly, without imagining that you carried life on your shoulders begging the heavens to free you from those chains of life that languish with time. Only you knew that pain, that exhausting stone that swirled in your chest and that prevented you from exhaling the joviality that we often saw.
I saw you pass like a breath on those wheels. You trotted and jumped on the stone road with a smile that hid fatigue. You held yourself with non-existent strength, smiling and with a certain petulance that hid the verve of the youth you once had. You made me smile that turned into laughter that made up the symphony of that afternoon. I was surprised at how good you looked fluttering in the wind, without cold or apparent worry. I let myself be carried away by the relief of seeing you so beautiful and rebellious, I felt that I admired you more if possible.
That afternoon turned into night by the dark blanket that lay over the pastures, I saw you pass by again and I could not see your countenance that withered from the cold. You turned into ice and I didn't know it. How could I know if you were always strong like a lioness and with your hair lit with vitality?
I remember your languid look as I carried you in my arms and felt the hammering of my heart because of the doubt if I could see that rebellion reflected in those slippery eyes again. I remember the exhausting wait and the senselessness of impatience knowing that going against time is a losing game. I stood on the cobblestone street watching your return and waiting for an answer that would end your gabela of life. However, between that possibility of ceasing to see you, we rose trembling from the lethargy of uncertainty and carried you in our arms and that was when it happened.
I held you in my arms as you let go, in great puffs and galloping breaths, the life that slipped through my efforts to carry you. I felt your grip on my soul that only my arm felt like the caress of a hand that said goodbye. My lips trembled to know what the invisible tears in my eyes refused to accept. You took my hand and I saw your gaze. Crystalline, begging for your pleas to be heard, eager for me to accept your departure and spirited because you finally got from life what you always asked for. I could see the fun in your eyes shining in the moonlight on that dark-shrouded street. In the end, always at the end, you laughed at life because you were not afraid of the scissors of fate, even if it was escorted by a black robe and silver scythe.
The last thing you said to me went away with the silence of your last exhalation, but I could see, in those brief moments that now taste like eternity, that you left me many lessons and your strength that carried so much. I don't know, and I still can't understand if it was a gift or a pernicious legacy, what you left me in essence. I didn't understand that resistance you lived with, but over the years I began to understand. That resistance can be as good as it is harmful to souls like ours. You were stronger than me and now I feel that I diminish with your memory and with the inheritance you left me. How sorry I am that I could not understand you at that moment.
In my memory, always in my memory, are imprinted the images of that bouquet we made for you. Vermilion petals dotted with crystalline drops, dragonfly-green chrysanthemums and white clouds speckling the floral canvas, all bathed in tears that never came out as you passed by us.
There are those who may question the decision I made at that moment not to let my eyes be clouded by sadness, but I did not accept that you were leaving as I did not accept to stop being strong for you. You didn't like tears, I remember that well, because you believed that this farewell deserved more than regrets. You deserved smiles for finally being able to defy life and achieve what it had been denying you for years. However, you know well how I am, I carry that sadness and the tears masked in my chest by those lioness claws that I inherited from you. Those tears are still imprisoned with the rest of others that have never come out, rarely come to light. I do not pour streams, I release rivers swollen with so much melancholy that they carry away my thoughts and wash my soul sometimes, when the channel is too high.
How did I remember you tonight? The melody of that bouquet has reappeared and has stirred the waters of the river of your memory. Your resistance is still part of that memory I carry of you, but it weighs more and more with the passage of time and the battles that never end. I'm not complaining, although I admit that I often do it ―Who can be so hypocritical to say that they are free of complaints in this life?―, I only remind you between these lines that are carried by the sound of the piano keys that sound and by the cold of the night that envelops my thoughts.
To: Deirdre
Today's melody:
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