GRIEF Poetry: FORGIVE DEAD, by Kelly Hegi

How do you forgive someone who is dead?
TW:Suicide

I thought I had. That I had taken the time and walked in your shoes.
And opened my hand to the idea that you were tired.
Tired of fighting.
Tired of all the judgment- it had to be hard to be judged and found wanting for 55 years.
Mene, mene, tekel, parsin.

I’m so sorry you had to live with that scarlet letter.
But I didn’t give it to you. All I saw was strength and grit.
I needed you and you chose a handful of pills. I needed you and it wasn’t enough.
I wasn’t enough to make you stay.
We could have come up with another way.
Mene, mene, tekel, parsin.

That shame that dogged you didn’t die with you. It’s now up to me and mine to send it
back to the pit it crawled out of.
A letter of a different color.
On the other side of time – you and I are going to have some words.
I miss you to my core
and

I’m not entirely sure I wouldn’t spit in your face if I was able to see you again.
Mene, mene, tekel, parsin.