esrosedotblog

I have never understood suicides.

The idea scares me. It seems a weird combination of moral lapse (the methodist boy inside me) and destruction of the ego. A destruction so profound that the whole subject eludes me. The self erases the self.

I escape to denial and sublimation.

But today, Irving Penn's portrait of Robin Williams suddenly appeared in the latest issue of The New Yorker.

There he was. Undeniably him with all the genius parts visible. The vulnerability. The nakedness.

Then it all hit me. A delayed reaction. The sadness. The shock. The impossibility of life ended so radically.

The despair that must have lain behind that intelligence, the talent.

There is nothing to say. I will stop.

At my age I have learned that no death can be explained in a satisfactory way. It is the great puzzle.

Why does it happen? Where do we go? What happens next? It is outside our living experience entirely. No living person has ever been able to explain it to me. And the dead do not speak.

Once again, I am flummoxed.

So, I just have the feelings. I look into the face for answers and the only thing I find is the great life the image celebrates. He was here. Now he is gone. God bless him for it all.

Labels: death, life