I hope I never have to.

To my sister,

If I were to ever lose you,
I would not know what to do.
The day you arrived in my life
with the rays of infinite stars
in your tiny, innocent eyes,
too young was I to realise
what you would come to mean
to the core of my being,
how you would become
the only one I would turn to
in hope, joy, sunshine, and rain,
why you would be more to me
than the label the blood we
share could ever reveal;
Some days, we spend hours
in conversation – the kind
that does not need an invitation,
whilst other days, the silence
of our souls does suffice,
rising above the loudest noise
to soothe, to heal, to mend
everything the world breaks
without mercy or compassion;
My secrets find peace in
the abode of your heart,
never meant to depart
the sacred halls so kind,
even when the tempests of
fury make me lose my mind:
When my words wound you
and yours are like a dagger
to my soul, the grief we find
sans a quest makes me feel
that no amount of pride can
outweigh the loss of your voice,
no level of hell can be worse
than the agony of losing you –
So, the stock of my apologies,
rarely put to use, seems ever
inclined to make an appearance
when the intended recipient
is you, as if under an invisible
spell, bound by an intangible rope,
surrounded by an emotion
time cannot hope to sever;
Today, I saw someone losing
her sibling to an accident
in a narrative that was fictional –
It is not as if this is the first time
such a thing has come to pass
in life or in art, and yet it gave
me pause, made me wonder:
How do sisters bury sisters,
How do sisters say farewell,
How do sisters carry on
when the ties of sisterhood
are covered with death’s hood?!
How does a sister survive
losing a piece of her soul,
one that did not merely
make her whole but meant
more than the oxygen that
makes her breathe and thrive?!
As my tears, my fears drive
this musing without rhyme
or metre, devoid of conscious
thought or deliberate action,
raw, real, rhetorical, repetitive,
this terrible thought is haunting
the horizon of my heart:
If I were to ever lose you,
I would not know what to do.
I would be a ghost walking
this earth, wandering aimlessly,
howling mindlessly, grieving
endlessly, searching recklessly
for the voice, the smile,
the silence, the words, the fury,
the hope, the peace, the light
that lit my path without trying
to, and yet it would not be enough;
If I were to ever lose you,
Oh, what would I ever do?!
As selfish as this sounds,
I strengthen an old vow –
if you go where I can follow,
I would fight to make amends,
till the clasps of death take me
captive, till the last of my energy
abandons me, till the hollow
transience of the chasm
between us is swallowed
by forgiveness, love, and hope,
but if you go where I cannot
come seeking you – and oh,
how the very thought cripples
me – I would not know life
as life, joy as joy, grief as grief,
love as love, strife as strife –
I would not know what to do,
and yet this is certain, that
you, my dearest friend, will sue
each echo of hope and every
sliver of light that makes
the most abominable of faults
seem like the kindest virtue;
If I were to ever lose you,
I would not know what to do,
so, I hope I never have to.
I hope I never have to.