No platitudes satisfy after a storm

No Hallmark cards for devastation

No words truly hold a heart freshly torn

It all feels like empty placation

On her childhood playground she watches the other children play. An impenetrable wall separates her from them, but she doesn’t know why. In her eyes they are one huddled organism, an exoskeleton with its armored back against her.

I didn’t plan to be raped that night. Staying home for once from the Copenhagen nightlife to prepare for a test the next day, I was reacquainting myself with a solitude I realized I had missed. Gently flickering candles and a hot shower caressed my senses, as I was exhaling into the unfamiliar quiet. My guard was down.

They took my breath away, my own weary people who came trickling into church after a long day. After what happened in the Emmanuel church in Charleston, still they came to this house of God.

Heavy and icky, a sense of doom presses down on me. At night, it jerks me from my sleep with scenes from what-if scenarios raising my pulse as efficiently as any horror move while endless do-do lists scroll like credits in the background.

Who would have known that a memorial service could be this life-infusing?! Honoring her by wearing happy colors rather than garments of mourning, we gathered with a vague feeling that this would be intense and “inspirational,” but we had no idea what we were in for.

I miss her voice the most. Like sunlight shimmering in a gently streaming rivulet, her words illuminated my soul with a glow that both comforted and inspired me. Oddly, I simultaneously relaxed into a deep sense of home and felt my chest swell with a burst of fresh adventure when I was with her.

Confidential cries cross the boundary of silence to my inbox in response to a survey of relationships. Humbled by their trust, I recognize my own struggles in many of these e-mails. There are nuts and bolts to be learned in long-term interactions -decoding of male / female languages and lessons passed from the seasoned to the less experienced.

I just turned 47. After more than two decades in America, I still haven’t grasped why it’s considered impolite to ask a woman her age. I am so relieved not to be 17! The world was spinning then, as an Alice-in -Wonderland concoction of disconnected experiments, and I didn’t know where to find solid ground.

Pain cast heavy shadows in the lines around your mouth, yet a will to persevere flowed through your lips,

Your eyes testified of agony and of battles fought and lost in loneliness, yet a tender vulnerability peered through, calling out to be embraced.