Poems and Novel about Grief

Aaron Saturn, 16, is an emotional zombie—stuck in grief for his little brother, Isaac, who died. Aaron longs for an escape, and thinks he’s found one when he meets Kim, a girl living on the streets of New York City’s East Village. But the real upheaval in his life hits closer to home. When his parents reveal a startling plan to change their family, Aaron goes into a tailspin. He needs to learn that running away won’t heal him. For that to happen, Aaron must be willing to let love back into his life. Love that may lead him to a real adventure.

Here are links to After Isaac: https://bookshop.org/beta-search?keywords=After+Isaac

https://www.amazon.com/After-Isaac-Avra-Wing/dp/0615669468

And two poems about grieving:

Find Something to Say

I pick up the phone to tell my son

his friend’s little brother 

killed himself Tuesday

and here it is Thursday 

and I’ll make it short

because the lady who cleans 

is waiting to vacuum. 

I didn’t know the boy, 

not really, and didn’t need to 

to feel the weight of his life dropping through Brooklyn, 

or the release of hearing 

my son, in another city, answer.

He must speak to his friend.

I must go there, face the parents, 

the brother. The grandparents.

Find something to say. 

I will enter their empty, empty house 

with the awkward sorrow 

of an acquaintance, bringing 

something picked up at the bakery 

and dumped on the kitchen table 

with the rugelach and baked ziti 

for people who will never want to eat again. 

A cruelty even to suggest it.

But expected. We must do what is expected.

This child thought otherwise.

A New Skill                                                                 

I see pieces of you everywhere:

someone tall, a beard, glasses, an earring.

I realize you’re not gone, just disassembled,

and it’s up to me to gather up those bits

to make you whole again, though.

I wish I had a resurrection manual.

If only I’d known earlier I could bring back 

the so-called dead, 

I could have been perfecting my technique.

First grandmother, mother, father,

moving on to mother-in-law, father-in-law, cousin.

And then you, friend. All those moments

I thought I saw one or the other of you 

walking across the street, on the subway. And in my dreams!

I should have been proactive. 

Practiced instead of mourning.

It would have taken work, travel, a keener eye. 

Certainly patience. But by now imagine the results.

Oh, my dear ones, I have failed you. 

Only yesterday a woman at Key Food just missed

being Helena. And I did nothing, just watched 

as she picked out avocados with such tenderness. 

I should have grabbed her. 

But, untrained, what if I messed up

like Dr. Frankenstein? 

And what if she were part of someone 

someone else had lost? 

If I’d interfered with someone else’s dead? 

But that has always been my problem. 

Not believing in myself. Not being selfish enough

to hold on to what is mine.