in der Leere: Sicherheit, Fluchtraum, pausieren, verweilen und bleiben, Verdrängung, sich wieder spüren, annehmen, Akzeptanz

"Death is nothing at all.
It does not count.
I have only slipped away into the next room.
Nothing has happened.

Everything remains exactly as it was.
I am I, and you are you,
and the old life that we lived so fondly together is untouched, unchanged.
Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.

Call me by the old familiar name.
Speak of me in the easy way which you always used.
Put no difference into your tone.
Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow.

Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes that we enjoyed together.
Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever the household word that it always was.
Let it be spoken without an effort, without the ghost of a shadow upon it.

Life means all that it ever meant.
It is the same as it ever was.
There is absolute and unbroken continuity.
What is this death but a negligible accident?

Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight?
I am but waiting for you, for an interval,
somewhere very near,
just round the corner.

All is well.
Nothing is hurt; nothing is lost.
One brief moment and all will be as it was before.
How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!"


(“Death is nothing at all” - Henry Scott Holland)

Great supports through heavy grief.

Beyond the door
There's peace, I'm sure.
And I know there'll be no more
Tears in heaven.
(Eric Clapton, "Tears in Heaven")

"It is also then that I wish I believed in some sort of life after life, that in another universe, maybe on a small red planet where we have not legs but tails, where we paddle through the atmosphere like seals, where the air itself is sustenance, composed of trillions of molecules of protein and sugar and all one has to do is open one's mouth and inhale in order to remain alive and healthy, maybe you two are there together, floating through the climate."
- Hanya Yanagihara, A Little Life

“Wieso macht man das eigentlich?“, fragte ich. „Wieso fühlt man sich nach einem Tod so oft schuldig, selbst wenn man weiß, dass es falsch ist?“ (...) „Wir suchen unsere Fehler und unsere Schuld, weil es leichter ist, als zu trauern ... Es lenkt uns davon ab.”
― Benedict Wells, Hard Land

"Der Tod eines Elternteils stört trotz unserer Vorbereitungen, trotzenderes Alters, Dinge tief in uns auf, er löst Reaktionen aus, die uns überraschen und Erinnerungen und Gefühle hochkommen lassen, von denen wir annahmen, sie wären längst auf den Grund gesunken. Es ist, al würden wir uns in dieser unbestimmten Periode, die man Trauer nennt, in einem U-Boot befinden, still auf dem Meeresboden, der Untiefen bewußt, mal näher, mal ferner, hin und her geworfen von Erinnerungen." (S. 33)

"The death of a parent, despite our preparations, defies age, upsets things deep within us, it triggers reactions that surprise us and bring up memories and feelings that we thought had long since sunk to the bottom. It's as if we were in a submarine during that indeterminate period called mourning, still at the bottom of the sea, aware of the shallows, sometimes nearer, sometimes farther, tossed back and forth by memories." (p. 33)

I discovered Eva ´s poems through the film « I am thinking of ending things » directed by Charlie Kaufman. In this film, the actress recites « Bonedog », a beautiful poem about how coming home is often awful. My partner and I were really touched by it and he decided to buy her books. I find her poems really really powerful.
I recommend.
Today I shared « Sickbed » with the team in the frame of our project.