pieces.

it's 3am

someone banging at the door

my sons crying

my mind racing

my heart screaming

"not this" my mind and heart beg.. "not this..dear Jesus, not this.."

i open the door

a man in uniform: dressed in sympathy, smelling of death.

a message without words: a folded flag, passed to me in silence.

i lose my breath as the man tells me Caleb lost his for good.

my heart and his body in pieces.

his pieces, i'm told, will be shipped here from Afghanistan to be buried.

my heart was in his hands.

still in his hands, or what's left of it is still in what's left of his hands.

my heart and soul will be buried with him,

but i want my body to be too.

A silent grave is better than the silent screaming inside my head.

feeling nothing is better than feeling nothing in a bed where i used to feel his everything.

my crying sons remind me that there's still something to live for.

Still something Caleb died for.

he lives on in my boys.

50% Caleb, 50% me.

If I can't die for that like Caleb did, I must live for it.

But living doesn't mean alive.

If Caleb's body can't be mended, neither can my heart.

broken i will stay.

But, I will stay.


R.I.P. Caleb