Thursday, November 02, 2006 -- 3:09 PM

1.

Death as a feeling is cold. It arrests us and turns us upside down and shakes all of our emotions out of us until we are empty of everything but itself. It brings to the surface the memory of the warmth of the last embrace before the sword fell once and for all, either suddenly or gradually. It is not, however, the warmth itself; it is the very opposite of that warmth. Our burning tears and pulsing blood will never take the place of that cold, as hard as they will try, and that cold becomes a part of us. Yet the touch of the cold is not all fatal. It drives us on to new life and makes all of our memories, the regrets at what was said, the regrets at what was left unsaid, the joy of all of our laughter, the tears we cried that all seem so unimportant now, our wishes of what could be, so clear in our minds that we can't help but to know that the warmth was real once, and will be real again. In this way we can be thankful for the cold and the discomfort for a time, as sharp as it is, knowing and appreciating that it will never leave us. For what is cold except the absence of warmth? Without it we would never know either.

2.

The cool fall air was everywhere and in everything. The trees felt it and began to prepare in brilliant colours that faded into the ground, and the people moving slowly down towards the cemetary were keeping it out in dark coats and scarves. It was a very still cold, so that the clouds of breath floated upwards and assimilated gently into the grey clouds and the hot tears that were everywhere among the crowd were quickly wiped away before chilling the cheeks of the mourners. The casket was akwardly unloaded and taken to the grave as the people continued to come, surrounding it, sheltering it from nothing. A restless little boy tried playing with his father, who responded by placing his hands firmly on his shoulders and kneeling down to whisper in his ear. A middle-aged woman buried her sobbing face in the shoulder of her husband, whose knuckles were white around her hand. The old women, the widows, who had seen far too many of these scenes, still did not accept the eternity of them and wept silently as they watched the family consoling each other as they had once been consoled. And all around the only interruption from the sobriety came from the birds, as careless and constant as death itself.

The eulogy given, the red roses placed irrevocably into the casket, the ceremony seared into the memories of everyone, the crowd dispersed, fanning out back across the cemetary. Looking back, it felt much colder as the small group of family remained frozen to the grave like a portrait.