stay

 Sometimes I can see my energy. I know what it feels like, what it looks like, how it sounds. 

My energy is cold heat, ever burning, never warming. It burns with passion and flame and my spirit writhes, but it is silent. Inside there is a scream. Released, it will tear its way out, ripping through soul and body and there will be blood. I dance in the flame, as it consumes me and is one with me. The fire burns within and without, but my spirit is cold. 

One beat. Two beats. Breath in. Breath out. Oxygen tingles all the way into my fingertips and and toes, seeps into the strands of my hair. I am alive, but we are all dying. Death will not be cheated, only postponed. 

It comes ugly and slowly. It takes privileges that we failed to recognize as such. It is taking my father. Death is playing dirty. 

This year has brought so much loss. 

I am asking politely, as politely as I can, addressing Death as a lady would a gentleman:

Please. Please don't take him yet. Please let him stay. Just stay. Stop hurting him and let him linger. He is needed and we are not done. This journey has more miles. 

How can a cold, silent flame burn so relentlessly? On and on, it burns. Call me, text me, give me news. I feel my skin crack open like a cicada shedding it's skin in a painful rebirth. I break apart, but am still whole. I am enrobed in flame and it consumes, but I do not burn up. My mouth opens, and I cry, but there is no sound. This is grieving, this is the pre-mourning. This is the knowing and the unknowing, the awareness of the inevitable, the inability to see beyond the next hour. 

Just stay. Please don't go. Let's have the coffee we always said we would share. Teach me your wisdom. Teach me (more) how to create beautiful things out of ugly, commonplace, raw materials. Laugh with me more. Be well. 

Just

stay.