Another Day |
By Shawna Schneider |
To Alexander Schneider, We will always remember you. Happy Third Birthday, Sweetie. With love, Mom and Dad |
This is a special day,
another day. Another day the sun rises to greet an empty cradle a box of tiny clothes long since packed a dusty picture frame. It shines across my face still wet with tears my aching, empty arms and my heart which bleeds anew. In moments I must change this all to greet the world for the world doesn’t like to know such pain remains. They just see the span of time and the children ‘round me gathered and would like to be left with their belief that these have healed me. The world is comforted with the thought that my pain has become a misty soft, sweet memory not the pain, frequently sharp stabbing, intense other times dull, throbbing and deep. Always there, somewhere. And so, for now, I play along as I sweep my smiling children along with me. I’m aware they do not see the three year old who’s missing. They sometimes remember the babe “but that was such a while ago…” “surely by now…” they think. To accept the grief remains so strong makes them uncomfortable and me a pariah to be tolerated tiptoed around not exactly welcome. Yet…there are those true friends who see the empty space of the three year old who’s not and stare into it longingly and with a sigh, a gaze. They pal my arm, a gentle squeeze, and move with me into another day without him. |
Alexander Schneider, the son of Shawna and Scott Schneider was born and died, May 10, 1994, due to Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome.
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