2. NO SACRIFICE
DoBH – MOD 2.24 AM
May 17th 2024
I miss you,
Not in the kind of way my heart hurts,
But like one yearns for a place now distant, familiar yet foreign.
On such days, a smile sneaks onto my lips,
I touch my chest, my heart thuds and I feel my spirit soar.
Somehow, you’ve become etched into my eternity, a symbol of Eros.
Today, I found myself in our old neighborhood.
It didn’t strike me until I stopped at the traffic light,
The one you swore had a vendetta against you,
It seemed to blink knowingly.
I was at the street that had woven through our lives—
The gym,
The butcher’s,
The quaint Indian shop,
That greasy spoon we swore off, except for our cheat days.
Our park, bustling yet devoid of life,
And that parking lot, our small haven.
I can’t count how many times we just parked there and contemplated,
What would we rather do instead of the hourly torture that was our gym instructor?
We had laughed,
We had argued whatever a bad day had carried,
We had burned it down together and made up.
A few times we had really made up,
Those memories still make my toes curl.
One moment, I’m navigating through the mundane of equal lack and abundance
The next, I am driving through a landscape rich with memories,
Each corner imbued with familiarity and understanding.
That traffic light switched to green so swiftly, almost as if it wished to affirm its loyalty to you.
I muttered a curse under my breath,
I smiled wistfully,
And made a U-turn to soak it all in one last time.
We were a masterpiece,
We had created beauty amidst chaos,
Answered prayers walking and breathing,
Perfect for human desires and status quo.
There were moments of pure happiness,
Contentment even.
The physical is easy to please,
But the soul, it has its own demands.
At the height of the blues season, when we least expected it, the universe gave passage for our souls.
What would it take to come together in the ways of the unspoken?
What were we willing to sacrificed to go back in the beginning?
Reunite and return to our genesis—Adam to Eve, Eve back to Adam
Were we ready?
If we were,
Perhaps we’d be cruising down this street together, Making plans for our regular life,
Debating if the Chinese place was good enough for our anniversary dinner,
You’d tease, “If you behave, we’ll do just fine,”
I’d look at you in utter bewilderment and smirk.
You’d call me your good girl and make plans to go misbehave elsewhere.
Maybe that would’ve been the day our souls finally surrendered and authenticated.
I miss you one last time as the light turns red,
I take it all in, the beauty of our life together.
The light reading the end of my thoughts turns green,
It blinks several times in agreement,
This is the goodbye I didn’t know I needed.
Driving away,
Elton John’s “No Sacrifice” fills the air.
Deborah Nyamu,
DoBH,
