Do not stand by my grave and weep

A friend of A's posted this poem on her birthday:

Do not stand at my grave and weep 

I am not there. I do not sleep. 

I am a thousand winds that blow. 

I am the diamond glints on snow. 

I am the sunlight on ripened grain. 

I am the gentle autumn rain. 

When you awaken in the morning's hush 

I am the swift uplifting rush 

Of quiet birds in circled flight. 

I am the soft stars that shine at night. 

Do not stand at my grave and cry; 

I am not there. I did not die.  

- M E Frye

But there is where you are. 

You are dead. And all I want to do is stand by your grave and weep; waiting for something - anything - to happen, for you to come back to me. 

I am so weary with grief. 

You were the lines on the map, the handle on the door, the bough from which every part of me hung. You assembled me. You followed me, you led me, you were with me when I needed you and when I did not. You chose to be beside me, and I beside you, we were for each other, and in loosing you I have lost a part of myself. When you went you took my certainty, my direction, all that I looked to when I looked away from what others call 'God'. You have left me alone in a familiar room that now seems like a siege tower; the door is unlocked but where is the knob? I cannot get out. I wring the air, twisting, grasping, but there's nothing left. Nothing alterable in the world. Only the same. Wake-up and breathe and hope to feel that sense of security that I had when I had you.

My father says that you can count all your true friends on one hand. I always stopped at one. Because if that one was you then one was enough. He told me that you would want me to work, work hard, and succeed. But I don't know if I can do it. I don't know if I have the strength. My chest is caving in from the pain of loosing you. And still nothing changes! The outside world remains similarly variable; it changes insufficiently, as expected, refusing to acknowledge that my heart is broken, the world is empty and black and over. And nothing will ever be the same. That I have lost my person: I am owner-less. I wanted to make you proud. What's the point now? Just horrible days passing, creasing the sky, the 5th (your birthday), the 18th (your diagnosis), the 25th (your death).

I don't even know where I'm going without you. So how can I begin to attempt to get there. And all the while a part of me feels that if I survive, if I succeed, if I go on, that it's like I'm killing you all over again, snuffing out the memories in order to continue living, which must mean that I never really loved you anyway, needed you anyway, desperately depended on you. Traitor. Traitorous living.

I would have given you everything, if you had asked, but you would never have done that to me, nor would it have made any difference if you had. But, I need you to know: I would have given you everything and I would still give it, if only to have you back. I love you. I miss you. Come back to me.