I sat with a friend- patting her hand..

Her son died this week- just

Shortly after her husband.

I took soup and apple crisp

And a willingness to enter…

Remembering the wisdom of breath-

“On the inbreath- just don’t turn away from the suffering”

This is not about fixing anything…

But somehow offering up my body

Breathing with the impossible reckoning

No sense – no shore to stand on

The death of her son-

And his brother

And their father.

I didn’t know her middle child

So I asked the group gathered to tell me about him

Meeting for the first time this exuberant human

Photos of him smiling

Holding up a mushroom

He’d found like it was the best thing ever.