The Dying Art of Letting Go

Winter sun hangs low in clear blue of sky, half-blinded by its potency,

yet I know what lies outside, beyond backdoor open, concrete patio

shiny wet, out there on untamed grass, while I am halted here in probing

warmth, amidst automaton tasks of the day. Everything has changed,

everything. 

Before, I was drawn into your garden at first hint of sunshine, riotous 

bark of pheasant, beckoning of ivy gargoyle green, heady dew of honey-

suckle, I was undone and reborn every time, but now this devastation,

wreckage lain bare, anguish reaching through eyes squeezing soul 

breathless.

Vaulted giants bare-branched standing guard along bottom edge of garden, 

your glassless greenhouse to the left, solid tomb of brick shed to the right, 

garrisoned behind this orchard now uprooted: bulging wounds in bleeding 

earth, black skeletal torn up humps, beached carcasses of stranded whales.

All talked of those gale-force winds, while you said so little. Did you sense 

the end they signalled? Did you bury finale’s inevitability? Steering, instead, 

our closing conversations to lighter matters: culinary adventures with pumpkin 

lasagne, windowsills of neglected radishes calling for attention.

Here in the doorway of your emptying bungalow, weeks of sorting–throw

away, give away, pack, sell. Bold blue rayon dress I never knew you kept, 

rings and perfumes I never knew you had, socks and books and gardening 

gloves overflow forgotten drawers, once hidden shelves. No emotion, only 

emptying. Evacuating a ship slowly sinking, this goodbye will be the last, 

for these rooms, these walls, this spacious green, this annual oasis of thirty 

years… Song thrush bursts into lament from within thicket of fallen trees, 

a sigh, then roar of breeze swells in uppermost branches of gleaming oak, 

of emerald firs, the wavering cry of distant sheep rolls and lingers mid- 

air, gutter trickles its steady, sedate drip of thawing freeze into drain 

beneath your kitchen window, as I read the message in these 

scattered remains of a storm, this blessing in heavy disguise:

It is over.

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Ann van Wijgerden

Born in London, the U.K., Ann van Wijgerden has spent most of her life in the Netherlands and the Philippines. She’s had her writing published in a number of magazines, and works with a charity providing education for children living in Manila’s slum area of ‘Smokey Mountain’.