focus only on small things

It happens so suddenly. People always say that, and still it catches you off-guard: how quickly the breath stops. How quickly the body cools. How the eyes—their big, beautiful, soulful eyes—will never again turn toward you and widen with delight. One moment, alive in your arms, and the next moment, not. 

This moment crystalizes into something sharp and white hot, piercing straight through the center of your chest. The jagged edges make it hurt to breathe. Everything in your line of sight is hazy, distorted. Nothing is quite real. 

How is this happening? How is this your life?

This is when you focus only on small things. The smaller, the better.

This poem, for example:

Separation

Your absence has gone through me

Like thread through a needle.

Everything I do is stitched with its color.

– W.S. Merwin

Read one small word at a time. Notice the space between the words. Notice the imprint they leave behind.

Breathe in (softly, softly). Breathe out (slowly, slowly). Repeat.

That’s it. That’s all you have to do right now.

This moment. And the next. And the next.

Look at your hands, the lines etched into your fingers. Peer into your palm like a fortune teller at a carnival. Then clasp your hands together. Give yourself something to hold on to. The marvel of touch.

Are you still breathing?

Focus on the next small thing: the chair underneath you, for instance. Or the bed, the sofa–wherever you’ve landed.

Imagine sinking down further into it, as far as you can go. Let yourself be heavy. Let yourself be held. The ground will catch you, I promise.

What does the air by your ears sound like? Can you hear your own breath? Does the silence feel too loud?

Say their name. First in your head. Then as a whisper, a fervent prayer. Keep saying it, like a mantra. Say it louder, if you need to. Tip your head toward the sky as you shout it, as if you could call them back into being.

You know why? Because they were here. With you, they lived a whole life. Because they matter.

Because they can still hear you.

Your next focus? Put your hand on your heart. If you’re feeling ambitious, put both hands. Sway side to side, forward and backward, like an infant being rocked to sleep. You can’t hold your baby anymore. You are your baby now, and you’re hurting.

But that’s not a small thing. So you go back to your breath.

In…

and

…out.

Feel the fabric of your clothes against your skin. Is it warm? A little scratchy? Maybe fuzzy?

Feel the texture of a tissue in your hand, so delicate. Notice the bright, piercing white. How it looks like the center of your chest. Hold it up toward the light and see if you can look through it, like a veil.

Think of how thin veils are. How there’s hardly any substance there at all, to separate one side from the other.

Blow your breath against it.

Watch how this one small thing, for one tiny instant, disappears completely from the space it occupied. Before it drifts downward again, a momentary forgetting.

Remember this.

Let us hold space for your grief when you’re ready.