How, we ask, do we keep going after they're gone?
We go through the motions--there are things that have to be done. We can do these things because we have to. We have plans set in motion, people to guide us through.
But after that?
What next.
We keep going.
It's quiet for a time after. No one says much. We're all thinking.
What next.
It'll get easier. We know that.
We start to smile when we think of them, not just cry.
The smiles will come easier after that.
It's not that we keep going because we know that's what they would have wanted. We keep going because that is what we are meant to do. They go and we stay. That's how it is.
That's how.
We keep going because we can. We have to. It's the way of these things. We have things to do. We have to get to work.
Get to work talking again, first. Laughing, next. Remembering the whole way, and sharing it. That's why we go, that's how we go. Remembering along the way.
We have stories to tell about them. They'll be kept alive through our stories, and our memories.
We say farewell, but not good bye. The story isn't over, not yet. We keep going.