My family has a thing about birthdays. Just about all of us across my husband’s family and mine have someone else with their birthday within a day. My husband and his sister are a day apart, as are my younger sister and me. They’re even on the same days of the month – the 28th and 29th. My other sister and a recently discovered aunt have birthdays a day apart, as well as sharing a name. My son and his cousin were born a day apart in the same year. My dad and my father-in-law celebrated their birthdays three days apart. And in 2002, my husband’s first niece and my first nephew were born on either side of Western Australia’s Labour Day long weekend, on opposite sides of Australia.
This birthday pattern makes it easy to remember when to send presents. And it makes it hard because my nephew passed away almost three years ago, but we can’t spend the weekend grieving because his birthday twin still deserves our excitement and joy for her special day.
So, I mourn in the lead-up to his birthday with what I call ‘pretty bad poetry’. It’s a great outlet for releasing and trying to understand my feelings, even if I can’t quite shape my words into something worthy of sharing. Then again, their rawness is what makes them real, so I often share them anyway.
I find it hard to imagine how my sister must feel, having lost a son who struggled to live. Despite his issues and the discrimination and lack of understanding they regularly faced, Owen was her son, and she didn’t want him to leave her. I don’t believe he wanted to go either because he fought against infection after infection for nineteen years until his body made the final decision for him.
When I was writing Brush Tales Silent Stories (https://www.amazon.com.au/Brush-Tales-Stories-Wendy-Manzo/dp/0645238759) with Wendy Manzo in 2023, she accused me (jokingly) of being an axe murderer. At the second Lisa Collyer poetry workshop last Wednesday, I looked at the words I had written about the attributes and adaptability of plants and realised Wendy was right. I can’t seem to stop myself from letting out the anguish and the grief and the pain of loss even when I’m not thinking along those lines.
ADAPTATIONS
28Feb24
Sink or swim –
that’s your call.
Close yourself up
like the flowers nestled
amongst the dunes
that follow the sun
and shun the moon,
or stand firm and sure
like the ancient towering gums
that edge the cemetery
where my nephew sleeps
underneath spinning circles
and plastic plants.
Make your choice:
Drift like tumbleweeds
blown about
at the mercy of the wind,
or take root
and face the storms
of Life.
At the first Lisa Collyer poetry workshop on Valentine’s Day, we were asked to compare something inanimate with a person. Before I knew it, I was writing about my nephew from the perceived perspective of my sister (his mother). Lisa had read a poem titled Your Shade by Lucy Dougan, which talks about the lipstick of a loved one being discontinued. That one word sent my mind off on its own journey, straight back into not being able to understand how the world marches on after someone’s life ends or how to reconcile that sometimes our belongings last longer than we do.
DISCONTINUED
14Feb24
You were discontinued.
Phased out.
No longer considered essential
or even desirable.
Let go by a society
that never claimed you as theirs
to begin with.
And yet,
the cold, hard metal
that framed the vinyl-covered mattress
on which you breathed
remains.
Easier to clean than you were.
Acceptable in both form and function.
Able to be explained.
Serviceable.
Durable.
Replaceable.
I see it every time I pass
your open door.
It will be with me
so much longer
than you ever were
But…
I cannot hug a bed.
Today (March 4th, 2024), Owen would have been twenty-two. If he was still alive, there would have been cards and presents and possibly even a small party. Owen couldn’t talk, or sing, or move his arms to give people a hug, but he could smile his enjoyment.
This year there will be no cards arriving in the mail, no presents to collect from the post office. My sister reverse-gifted some of his favourite presents to people who she thought would enjoy them. That’s why today’s photo is Star Wars plushies that until now have had no connection to my words. Chewie and Chewie and Chewie sit on a couch in our games room as a visual memory of a missing cousin and nephew.
For my sister, there will also be no cheerful phone calls from people too far away to visit to celebrate Owen’s birthday. She will walk past his room, see his empty bed, and feel a fresh sting of pain and loss and anger that her son’s bed outlasted him. But my gift to my nephew is that I will call his mother (my sister) and give her the best present I can: to talk about her son as a person loved and remembered on his special day despite his physical absence. Happy birthday, Owen.
A Glorious Mess 