WANTING: APRIL 8, 2025

Two weeks ago, the landscaper arrived to pick up sticks and blow winter’s detritus from the gardens. The next morning, everything was covered under a lofty blanket of snow. From a window I observed a cardinal perched regal in the platform feeder under a white frozen roof peaking 10” high, a crowned crimson caller strident in a gray-toned theater marbleized in snow-coated limbs. For me, spring’s denial is a welcome yawn to the inevitability of unfurling and birthing.

I’ve been trying real hard to work on my memoir draft, having put aside all other writing for the past four weeks. No essays, Substacks, even brushing off Threads. Only reading memoir and writing craft. A little journaling which served as the seeds for this essay. I’ve been out of my daily poetry routine too, having putting it aside for the past year to care for my nonagenarian mother-in-law and standing up for the War Against Terrorism in NYC, Washington DC, Cuba.

It’s been difficult staying focused for several weeks, with Davin’s birthday advancing in the calendar. 32. I feel laden with devastation. It’s taken Sisyphean effort to simply move through the days. The manuscript project feels so big and open-ended. I’m always hard on myself; why can’t I push it out? When will I be able to tell a person that I’ve completed a first draft, my poetry book, published a poem or essay? I’m asked, “What chapter are you on?”

So I diverge; add throw pillow covers to my Amazon cart to cheer up the couch, search another ancestry manifest to resurface ancestors, weed through paper files to reduce the chaos, light a fire. Small projects that have clear beginnings and endings offer a sense of victory that feels worthy of a slice of chocolate cake. A hug.

I went to the dump last weekend, emptied a box with his college papers and books that I had gifted him over the years. A man approached, “ooh, there’s some good things in here.” Lifting my arms overhead to clear the giant steel container, I tossed the metal shelf unit that stood beside his bed holding a pair of eye glasses, a deck of cards, and a Mets cap.

On another day, I sat on the floor in my office and separated the Social Security survivors benefit statements into ten groups of three; Davin, Dylan, Deborah, stacking them in retrograde back to October, 2001. Next, were statements for the life insurance trust I purchased in 2007, a gift to protect their “awards” and cover estate taxes if I died before they were fully fledged (before the filing threshold reached $14.6M). These diversions have rendered feelings of nostalgia and sadness. I want to close my eyes and reawaken into 2003 in the little house in Freeport, Long Island. The three of us snapping worlds together with multi-colored bricks, living our sweet and challenging life, however editing out the relationship I became entangled in that diluted it. Had I so earnestly desired a male mentor for them and cohort for myself, that I missed what was already working well enough for us?

Over the course of two days, I cleaned out the files encapsulating my professional certifications and employment records. The career abruptly paused. It’s been my intention to return, for twenty years. A passion that I fought for and worked hard at to achieve. Before losing David in the terror attacks on 9/11, we were driven to build a life while creating a solid foundation for our boys’ success and planning a comfortable future for ourselves. But as absence lengthened into years, and ordinary life became increasingly contorted by the complexities of 9/11, I could no longer fist the motivation for world building. Still quivering in the gray matter, the sensation hasn’t left me. The fury of two middle-aged lovers dove-tailing the architecture of their co-mingled futures. The exhilaration!

I miss Davin, my beautiful, willful boy who furnished the composition. The four years and five months since his leaving have stretched into five birthdays . No. To say I miss him is like saying I miss my waistline, or the opportunity to buy a new car before the tariffs take hold. It’s not as much a pathos of missing as it is of wanting. I want my son, in the world. I ache to witness his fury building the architecture of his life. Revel in his achievements. Redeem continuity. I want to update the Gift Davin note on my phone, frost his birthday cake, shop for enchilada mix, gift wrap a book.