songs for abigail

Today is the year anniversary of my daughter's stillbirth.

I don't have a lot to say about it, at least right now. I've written about it a lot in past weeks, and talked about it with very close friends, but right now I just find myself sort of wordless and grieving.

Still, I would like to share these poems I wrote in the days after her stillbirth. I wrote many, many poems in those days, but these are my two favorites, in order of favoritism.

Songs for Abigail

VI

Still the bells and muffle the drums;
with solemn step the parents come.
With weeping hearts and lowered eyes
they curse the day that Abigail died.

Let the trees shed their leaves in the summer field
Let the autumn harvest refuse to yield
Let the birds fold their wings and forsake the sky
The world must be broken, that Abigail could die.

Tell the mourners in a somber throng
To quiet their cries and swallow their song
Let the silence beg the question why,
of all that is possible, Abigail should die.

Stop the waves on the ocean’s shore
Stop the seasons’ changes evermore
Stop the sun in its eternal sky
Let the world mourn that Abigail has died.


III

It’s rained every day since you died.
As if the world weeps with us
and the clouds could swaddle our grief.

A hollow place in the world
echoes with your absence
the space where you should be, and aren’t.

I can almost feel on my pinky finger
where your grip should curl, and surprise me
with its strength. But your hand lies motionless.

It is hard to believe our hearts can keep beating
when yours is silent forever.
That was not the miracle I expected from your birth.