By Dotsie Isaac
Her mouth. Frozen wide . . . in a silent scream.
Her face, a question mark asking . . . ”What do you mean?”
Eyes . . . staring but unseeing
Ears hearing but not listening
Mind not comprehending
Lungs not expanding
Chest caving in
On the jackhammer that used to be her heart
This news would tear her apart
If only she would hear it.
A helicopter crash
A fire in the brush
Her husband
Her daughter
Lambs at the altar . . . of this nasty, brutish life.
Kobe. Kobe! Kobe!
Where you be?
And where is Gigi?
Forty-one. Much still undone
Thirteen. Thirteen! Pursuing a dream
Lord, the brevity!
And Lord, the gravity!
Her disbelief gets no relief
It transcends her grief.
Vanessa Bryant
Her Kobe was a giant
A super hero
Stop telling her that lie
Super heroes don’t die
They know how to fly
And we’ve seen him fly, haven’t we?
Fly high above the rim.
Defying gravity
Surviving injury
A Black Mamba
A venomous member
He knows how to survive
How to stay alive.
In the midst of devastation
Vanessa is not present
It is self-preservation
For now, she looks back and is frozen in time
Much like Lot’s wife, if only for a while.
A block of salt
Tears that will not dissolve.
Until she finds some resolve
Inside her, there’s an earthquake
She cannot escape
The worst since living in L.A.
But today, she doesn’t run to the doorway
Today, she doesn’t drop or seek cover.
She does not try to hold on
Because Kobe is gone.
Her Kobe. Met her and made her his queen
At seventeen.
And her beautiful, energetic, athletic, Gigi. Her second child
With a smile as wide as the Nile
They say she’s gone too
And she does not know what to do
So she stands, a gathering storm of unshed tears
Unable or afraid to confront her fears
Death did find them knowing they were dying.
Did she scream, “Daddy!”? Was she crying?
It is the instinct of a father to protect his daughter
Was he able to hold her?
To console her?
What is she to do with . . . this?
All of . . . this?
Her hurt. Her loss. Some call it pain
But what she’s feeling has no name
Vanessa stands rooted in a timeless space
Her dark hair framing her widow’s face
Latina eyes . . . staring but unseeing
Unbelieving ears hearing but not listening
Mind not comprehending
Lungs not expanding
Chest caving in On the jackhammer that used to be her heart