The Polar bear and my uncle's last breath!
The snow falls in the winter, the Polar bear crawls and freezes almost to death. It’s blood stops flowing, it’s lungs harden into ice, it’s heart comes slowly to a halt. The heart is always the last to go. But when the snow melts in the spring, the ice thaws from it ventricles, the crystals dissolve from it’s lungs. And just as slowly as it almost died, the Polar bear awakens and comes back to life.
For 12 hours we waited for my uncle to wake up. My family mumbling prayers around the doctor who tells us he fell into a coma when his brain haemorrhaged. And my father hasn’t stopped praying since. My grandmother searching the eyes of doctors for the answers to those prayers. His wife making towers of her arms, sending prayers to god. While I attempted to believe that my faith far exceeds science and that God would awaken him some how;
AWAKEN SWEET UNCLE. Tell me that my tears, the size of mustard seeds will fall upon your cheek and move the mountain of swelling inside your brain. Tell me that the same God who makes all things possible can still live up to his name. Because right now your mother, who’s cursing God for being too coward to make up his own mind as she stares at the medical forms granting the hospital permission to let you die.
“If you want him, then take him” she says. “Who am I to decide?” And by her side is your wife, who’s fists are stones, and But your daughter, Pallavi, sits at your bedside reciting the alphabet poem that was recently taught in school. She eagerly waits for you to wake up, and kiss her, but little does she know you’re in a coma. “God will resurrect my son” my grand mother says. “Please God, tell me he’ll resurrect.” How do I respond? How do I agree when the tubes of your IVs(drips) intertwine around my throat? Strangles my voice every time I plea in my mind “AWAKEN SWEET UNCLE.” Make this piece of writing easier for me to write. Tonight, pull out the respirator in your throat and speak the words that will end this piece of writing brighter than it begun
But during the 12th hour, the doctor gave us the results of the last test my uncle ever took. And I swear we’re not built for earth quakes like that. My knees buckled like a bridge, my arms shaking too much to catch another one of my sister’s crash landings. None of us were left standing, we were all falling through the cracks, falling until we hit the floor of the hospital room that night. This is what rock bottom must look like. The nurse disconnected the machines, our hands stretched to reach a part of you, our tears dropped as fast as my uncle’s heartbeat, our sanity vanished with his breath. Faster it faded, my father stroking his face. Faster it faded, my sister pressing her hand to his cheek. Faster is faded, we’re still waiting for a miracle. Faster it faded, Pallavi’s face planted to my belly “Teju, this hurts.” Faster it faded, and then it was finished. The monitors dropped to zero, and as his breath emptied and his heartbeat slowed, a wife became a widow. It was his heart that was the last to go.” It was silent after that. Silence as my father reaches over to shut his brother’s eyes. My grand mother released a long awaited sigh. I straightened the creases in my uncle’s blanket. His sweet young daughter Pallavi, places a kiss on her dad’s forehead. “Put in a good word to God for us.” My grandmother wept. And that’s when I knew, that all along we had failed to see the light at the end of this tunnel he was going through. Because while we were praying for his awakening, the awakening was really meant for us. to remind us that life is a coma we can still choose to wake up from. That faith means not having to wait for the sun to come, because sometimes the sun doesn’t come. But we can still rise on our own. His last breath has already blown life into the candles of our bones, with nothing more than a wish for us to live more fully.
The Polar bear freezes almost to death in the winter and comes back to life in the spring. So sleep now, sweet uncle.
It has been exactly 7 years, 7 winters since you slept. We’re still waiting for you to come back during the next spring, at least.
Pallavi misses you.
when the snow melts in the spring, the ice thaws from the Polar bear’s ventricles, the crystals dissolve from it’s lungs. And just as slowly as it almost died, the Polar bear awakens and comes back to life. unfortunately humans don’t. You’ve surrendered your life for too many winters. We’ll take it from here. Your sweet little daughter asks you to sleep now and wherever you wake may you be reborn with wings on your back. Fly into the sun and know that when our own winters end, spring will come and we’ll see each other again. So until then, Yeah, put in a good word to God for us.