There is no need for the sleeping pills any more. I can sleep now.

This evening I even dressed up and attended a farewell party for my dearest friend. She will move to another country after a month. Another Adieu. The venue was just across the road from his school and was filled with young adults and their parents. A few of his teachers were there too. It was a warm evening with a gentle breeze. There was light in the sky till just before 10 pm.

Standing in a circle my friends talked about the kids being home during the summer holidays. I had nothing to contribute to that conversation. I watched my mind going into rewind mode. This time last year he …… Kew Gardens ….. cycling ….. Brussels….

Little daggers are punched into my heart several times a day – being at the railway station at least twice everyday, walking past the GP surgery, discovering his prescription in the heap of papers long awaiting sorting out, finding an errant letter trying to sell a credit card addressed to him in the post.

On the surface, things are starting to look ‘normal’, but the little daggers work away diligently in the background.

This is an excerpt from a poem shared on Facebook by another grieving Mum – “Son” written by the Russian poet Pavel Antokolsky, a year after the death of his 18 year old son Lieutenant Vladimir Antokolovsky, killed in action on June 6th,1942…

Farewell then my son. Farewell then my conscience. 
My youth and my solace my one and my only. 

And let this farewell be the end of a story, 
Of solitude vast and which none is more lonely. 
In which you remain, barred forever and ever, 
From light and from air, with your death pangs untold. 
Untold and unsoothed,not to be resurrected. 
Forever and ever, an 18 year old. 

Farewell then, no trains ever come from those regions 
Unscheduled or scheduled, no aeroplanes fly there. 
Farewell then my son, for no miracles happen, 
As in this world dreams do not come true. 

Farewell… 

I will dream of you still as a baby, 
Treading the earth with little strong toes, 
The earth where already so many lie buried. 
This song to my son, is come to its close.