Lament for I'Chaya
He was just a pet. That is what people thought, anyway. But he really was not. He was my friend when no one would play with me. He was my companion on my lonely sojourns into the desert. He was my protector against all manner of cruelties at the hands of my peers, my family, and my society. He was my confidant, the only one who listened to my ideas, my dreams, and my fantasies.
He was just an animal, barely sentient. Yet, beneath his honey colored fur, behind his warm brown eyes, he was a sweet soul who loved me. He was joyful when I returned home, tired and dispirited. He would dance around me, wagging his blunt tail, shaking his ears to try to make me laugh, and laugh I did, hidden giggles, muffled in his warm ruff. When he ate, he would wear his food all over his face and ears like a banner of greedy success and offered to share the tasteless gruel because I was his family. No one who knew him believed he lacked intelligence, his very empathy, sensitivity to my moods, belied it.
Just before he died, I felt the hard scrapings of desperation; surely there was something, some way to save him, to keep him with me. My father said it would be a great kindness to let him go; he was in pain. But what if Father was wrong? What if he could be healed? What of my pain? How could I continue without the one touchstone, connecting me to my very soul?
The day he died, I felt such emotion, such grief, I should have been ashamed, but I was not. My father told me it was logical to mourn the passing of this creature that had been my companion throughout my short life. Logic had nothing to do with it.
The day he died, my childhood died with him. I felt barren, my emotions stripped down to bare pain. It eventually became easy to lock them away without him there to nudge them back to life. Lack of emotion is numbness, is it not? My father says no, logic gives one the structure to master the pain, to acknowledge it and turn its red energy into cool patterns. I am a child. I cannot understand what he wants me to do with this absolute feeling of desolation.
The day after he died, the boys who always tormented me, did not. It was as if my loss found a resonance with them, that they finally understood, some emotional pain could not be touched, should be shielded. If that is true, I hate them for their pity. I am grateful for their small kindness. Without him to give me my strength and bolster my pride, I would have physically harmed them.
I am so very tired. I feel carved out; only a brittle outer shell remains. My mind blanks, my breath stutters, I weep, perhaps for the last time for he who was just a pet, an animal, and my friend. I will have none other.