Gabriel (7 page)

I who am merely a woman

My senses falter

My hand trembles

The pen refuses my service

The page is shaking

And cannot bear the words of grief

Let my silent suffering

Bear witness to my desolation

And then all at once

He was sitting across from us

In a booth by the window

In a crowded restaurant

On Route 9 I think

Maybe on Seventy-seventh and Broadway

It was natural to see him

Staring at the menu

And figuring out what to order

Oblivious to the jukebox

And the din around us

His native habitat

Excitement overwhelmed me

And I stared at him so intensely

I almost lit up his face

Don’t spook him
Laurie said

He doesn’t know

What’s going to happen

We knew we had seen it all

But he was careless

And didn’t understand

You’re my only son

I ventured but I couldn’t tell

If he heard me over the music

It was so familiar to see him

Sitting across from me again

In the early morning light

It was as simple as daylight

Dawning between us

I could still speak to him

Grief broke down in phrases

And extrapolated lines

From me without myself

Tear-stained pillow of stone

I felt I was lying

Beside him in the coffin

Wormy mother

Who takes us into the ground

With her whenever and wherever

She wants the grass glistens

And grows over us in the heat

Of late summer in the country

It was hard to breathe

When dust choked the treetops

And clotted the roots

Stay calm the light wind blows

Through the branches at night

Peer up at the moon

Not knowing who I am

I was lying beside him

In the coffin I still couldn’t breathe

And so I woke up in the shadow

Of morning black light

And put on my mourning clothes

His mother also slipped into black

Treachery of the parents

Who outlive their son

It was too late to warn him

What had already happened

He was going ahead alone

I did not know the work of mourning

Is like carrying a bag of cement

Up a mountain at night

The mountaintop is not in sight

Because there is no mountaintop

Poor Sisyphus grief

I did not know I would struggle

Through a ragged underbrush

Without an upward path

Because there is no path

There is only a blunt rock

With a river to fall into

And Time with its medieval chambers

Time with its jagged edges

And blunt instruments

I did not know the work of mourning

Is a labor in the dark

We carry inside ourselves

Though sometimes when I sleep

I am with him again

And then I wake

Poor Sisyphus grief

I am not ready for your heaviness

Cemented to my body

Look closely and you will see

Almost everyone carrying bags

Of cement on their shoulders

That’s why it takes courage

To get out of bed in the morning

And climb into the day

Arriving for the funeral

Disoriented hysterical

It was too much to go through

My mother Gabriel’s biggest advocate

Argued that he was a born

Salesman and consumer like her

He had a bit of the con

So what that’s necessary in business

She thought I should stake him to a company

You’re too tough on him
she said

Until she was around him for a few days

And then she thought I wasn’t tough enough

I discovered the secret of the bond

Between grandmother and grandson

A common enemy

My sister Nancy and her partner Chelo

His cousin David followed him around

They found him a sweet soul

My sister Lenie too a therapist

He liked to tease her about psychotherapy

Which was
way overrated

Janet’s relatives my cousins and friends

My family wanted to bury him in Chicago

Where he could be near my dad

He wouldn’t be so lonesome

Because everyone treks out to visit

On Father’s Day and other holidays

But he was a true New Yorker

The city he loved and so we purchased

A plot in Mount Eden Cemetery

Who had always clanged

Like a bell in the darkness

Was now silenced

And I stood in the funeral home

Mute and disbelieving

To bury my son

With the other ritual mourners

My mother my ex-wife my two sisters

My lover in stunned grief

I climbed up a stepladder

To gaze down into his face

Which I touched with my hand

I leaned over and kissed him

On the forehead

It was chilly and hard

I kissed him on the lips

They were stone cold

It was like kissing a corpse

I started keening and wailing

A sob came out of my body

A sound I had never heard before

It was animalistic primal

The wailing the terrible keen

Kept bursting out of me

I wandered off to the side

My relatives cried back and forth

Between the coffin and the pew

Low muffled shrieks and sobs

All the women ringing

Beside themselves

I hope there is a God

Shahid said after his mother died

He owes me an apology

Melville does believe in God

Lawrence Thompson told his class

He thinks He’s a real son of a bitch

I solemnly swear before God

That a real Son of a Bitch

Who does not exist

Owes me an apology

Which I will not accept

Anyway I thought the Lord

Cannot help me now or ever

It’s a ceremony to say goodbye

The rabbi explained

I do not believe I think

I understand why the old Jews

Tear their clothes and cover the mirrors

Maybe it’s not the best time

To think about God’s absence

The insensibility of nature

Prayers can help you

Prayers cannot help you

Excessive mourning is forbidden

What else are there but rituals

To cover up the emptiness

O Disbelief

Lord Nothingness

When my son’s suffering ended

My own began

Why did the sun rise this morning

It’s not natural

I don’t want to see the light

It’s not time to close the casket

Or say Kaddish for my son

I’ve already buried two fathers

With a mother to come

Isn’t that enough Lord who wants us

To exalt and sanctify Him

I don’t want to wear the mourner’s ribbon

Or wake up crying every morning

For God knows how long

I don’t want to tuck my son into the ground

As if we were putting him to bed

For the last time

Close the prayer book I will not pretend

That God brings peace upon us

And upon all Israel

I don’t want to hear anyone

Scolding me from her wheelchair

Because I’m crying too hard

I’m not worried about a heart attack

Nothingness

You’ve already broken my heart

I will not forgive you

Sun of emptiness

Sky of blank clouds

I will not forgive you

Indifferent God

Until you give me back my son

I was shaking but I was also looking down

At myself from a great distance

Poor grief-stricken father

I pity you I thought

Your heart is lying there

Stretched out in a box

In a Jewish funeral home

And now you must say goodbye

Lamentations forever bereft

The limousines were already lined up

On West End Avenue

For the procession to the cemetery

He would have liked the black sedans

The friends and relatives gathering

Outside the parlor for the funeral

It was time to close the casket

The funeral director said cautiously

There was no more time blanked out

I had to stand on a stepladder

To reach him I couldn’t tear myself away

From leaning down and kissing him

On the eyes the forehead the cheeks

The lips colder than ice

The wretched sound

Started coming out of me again

He was there in the coffin

He was not there in the coffin

It was Gabriel it was not Gabriel

Wild spirit beloved son

Where have you fled