Two ways of looking at it
I wish I could explain the
importance of the notebook. It’s one of those
old black and white composition books, barely
held together by 45-year old glue and
stitching, the edges of the pages the color
of dead oak leaves, cured by time. An
artifact, a little piece of Kevin,
half-filled with poems of late adolescence,
poems that he probably wrote in his senior
year of high school. They are short and
generally angry, each one typewritten and
stapled or taped to the front of a page.
If I could explain the importance of the
notebook, maybe I could explain the
importance of Kevin. How can someone who
tried to destroy me, who battered my mother
emotionally, be so key to who I am? Kevin was
extraordinary. I’ve never met anyone like
him, a man who pushed himself out of a
childhood of emotional and physical abuse and
formed a self out of will and ashes. He was a
poet, a self-taught carpenter, a working
class intellectual. In the midst of
fatal
illness, he completed his
dissertation and received a PhD. He was
also so wickedly funny that my mother and
I still laugh when we remember his stories
and jokes.
Kevin sometimes ripped us to shreds with that
knife-like wit. He was an active participant
in the neglect that led to my pregnancy at
sixteen. Whenever he saw hypocrisy or hidden
motive – which was often – he skewered the
hypocrite, uncloaked the motive. His ability
to see the darkness in himself and others
never took into account the overwhelming
goodness we each have, the lightness that
makes up most of who we are.
I have a lot of empathy for him, whose
cruelty and black math was caused by a
childhood of pain and anger, but it probably
helps that he is off stage now, six years
dead. It was a long and painful exit. Kevin
didn’t deserve to suffer, to be hospitalized
for six months, to have his body whittled
down to 80 skeletal pounds. He didn’t deserve
to lose his ability to swallow and sometimes
to breathe unassisted. No one deserves what
happened to Kevin. But that time of suffering
was also a time to make peace. I was at the
hospital for hours almost every day, there
for both him and my mother, keeping company,
being a second set of eyes to make sure no
mistakes were made. I was there for comfort.
It gave me a chance to prove my humanity, to
show that we all have the ability to be good.
Even him. Even me.
Sometimes I still believe it. But writing
that paragraph about how I benefited from
Kevin’s suffering leaves me with a dirty
feeling, as though I relished the opportunity
to be redeemed through his pain. It wasn’t
like that. I was there because I wanted to
be, couldn’t imagine being anywhere else.
Kevin’s final day stretched
and stretched from early morning into late
afternoon. A small group of family gathered
in his hospice room and listened to him wind
down, heard the silent spaces grow between
each breath, watched his heart flutter out
from under his ribcage. Outside, daffodils
were pushing through once-frozen ground and
the forsythia was in bloom. The world was
coming to life again as we sat and waited for
death.
It came with a dramatic final exhale followed
by dead quiet. The dog broke the silence with
a bark, my mother reached for me and Kevin’s
son, held us and cried. Mom later said she
felt Kevin’s energy leave his body, had an
image of him walking along a river path
against a cloudless sky, his old collie Augie
by his side. When Kevin's brother thanked me
for my presence, I said, "I'm so glad we had
this time," and immediately regretted it.
What was I saying? Those six months of dying
were great? What a wonderful opportunity for
me?
That night I woke up after midnight to the
pressure of Kevin’s hand on mine, a grateful
and loving presence. Don’t be hard on
yourself. You were there for me. Thank
you.
Then he was gone.
Two
Ways of Looking at It
Kevin Sheehan (Knife Gift)
The magician, who is about to perform,
is wearing a suit which belongs to
his father. No one is supposed to know
that he is not his father. His first
trick, which involves some
simple sleight-of-hand, is well-received.
he bows, and the suit collapses.
And what if I would not grow up,
would not perform
the necessary murder. So what.
Was it any of your business?
I chose to be the child, hurt
and unhurting, but my body,
my beauty, betrayed me.