Who will eat my grief

When the grief eaters came for me, they took their time, waited every second and searched diligently for my grief. Like a child who searches for a needle in sand, they dug deeply into every corner of my body, waiting for the manifestation of the signs. Carving into every section of my body, they used their best instruments to look for it, they even flew in one of their experts who had a Ph.D. In eating grief from people, money wasn't spared, it was the best of the best. Some declared that my grief was nonexistent, that if there were no manifestations of the symptoms, that meant it wasn’t there. But others insisted,  they had seen my type of grief before, some  other patients they had worked with  cleverly hid theirs in corners of the body nobody  would  think of. They told my family that my case was not an issue for concern and flung their concerns into the air, hoping that the heavens would prove them right.  They said that they found one’s grief hidden behind the eyes, that they couldn’t sleep like normal people. That they could be present with you but their eyes gazed into another world. They also found some of their grief hidden in the pit of their stomachs. They told my family to look out for those signs when they had left from their weekly check-up—but my family was busy manifesting their own grief and the grief was performative in the eyes, after all the death of a mother deserves an Oscar performance from the family.

When our mother died, we all died along with her. We had predicted the death of our father, after escaping death five times, two of them from the account of his childhood stories and the others we witnessed with our eyes. If anybody had the life of a cat, our father was that man. He had dodged death with the skill of those who look like they could trick the gods into coming back even when the hourglass had run out. But we also knew that his life was closely tethered to our mother, for as long as she was alive he would live for her. So the very first time he died with the darkness closing on us, we surrounded him and prayed in all tongues that we knew. You see we were a God believing family, so we sent death on its way. We had broken into sweat and fear hung in our hearts also. Faith versus fear, fear versus faith, those two make a great combination when in the face of death and that night our faith worked for us. Our father didn’t die, but neither did our fear. We became hawks,watching our father. My mother became an owl at night—always praying. The little sleep she could get was from the early hours of the morning before she went to her shop. Slowly I saw my mother age without celebrating her birthday. Her legs bent from prayers into arthritis. Once an athlete for her state, she had to struggle to stand up some days, while on others, the pain was insignificant.

The second time our father almost died, it was in our house. This time my mothers faith had grown bigger than her worries. Her faith had grown so strong she had told her dead husband to come back to life and he came back to life. But after that death she stopped living for herself and even her children. We, the children, were jealous of that devotion. When her first son told her to come to the USA, the one place she always talked about going for Omugwo, she declined him. She said her place was with her husband, that there was no one to take care of him but that was a lie. We were more than willing to take her place even if it was for a few months. In fact one of us, our elder sister, had refused to marry and dedicated her life to taking care of our parents especially our father but that wasn’t enough for my mother, nothing was enough for her except her own presence. I have carried this irredeemable trait from her, the inability to leave, the urge to save everyone but myself.

There was a story about a man who had once hidden his grief so well that he ran mad from it. The story was that he had lost his wife and children on the same day. When the grief eaters came to eat up his grief it was already too late. The grief had spread through all parts of his body and it had eaten out his brain. His memory was besieged by grief——the loss was too much to bear, that was the diagnosis. My family begged that I should stop hiding my grief. But I wanted to tell them that I wasn’t hiding it, that I just couldn’t exprèss it or even trace it so that it can be excavated. What my family didn’t know was that I had grieved before. That in the year 2020 when the covid came to silence the world and bodies had dropped in the streets of London, China and USA. While we waited patiently for the rain of bodies, I had lost a child through abortion.  I stayed in the hospital room and danced with death. I begged God, telling him to have mercy on me because  of my mother who loved him. My family didn’t know that I had mourned for months, feeling guilty but not apologetic because I knew I wasn’t ready for that responsibility.  My grief was hiding in different corners of my body, in tiny molecules that it intensified whenever it felt like and refused to come out in full appearance which made it difficult to dictate.

As a child, the favorite part of my body that my mother took specific care of was my hair. My hair, the color of chestnut, had borrowed its length from hers . My hair was my inheritance which was the only thing that bound us together through my rebellious teenage years. It was the deal breaker to our silence, the saloon hours of choosing a hairstyle and compromising into something decent. It was the one thing we had in common when it came to our beauty. I enjoyed intensely combing mothers hair which was unreasonably long and full while mine was just long. This hair brought us together in so many ways that other mothers wished they could share with their daughters. This was enough reason to keep me happy and void of jealousy when mother loved my sister who was everything she wanted from a daughter. Not me whose stubbornness reeked from my very fingertips. I was okay with the time I shared with my mother, our saloon times accumulating through the years. Who knew something as insignificant as hair could hold mother and daughter together?

My sister, my mothers favorite, is a grief eater. She eats people's grief for a living but she was too busy removing her own grief when mine was in hiding. She was the closest to me despite our age differences and she couldn’t tell why my own grief was in hiding. When a family loses someone, they mourn collectively. My question is what happens when the weight is heavier on one side than the others. If the person who died was a good person and loved everyone, did the person love some more than the others? Especially if it was a mother. Do the children really mourn collectively or do they mourn the version of the mother they saw. I think it is easier to mourn a bad woman because then they know they just lost a mother who birthed them by chance. But a mother who showed love to her children, especially in different measures but almost the same scale will be mourned differently.

How well am I mourning my mother?

I lose count of the days. I retell the last time I hear my mothers voice on the phone as she is irrevocably proud of me. She is counting down the days I come to see her in Lagos. I am a soul in a skin that can’t withstand the weight of Lagos. Eko ko ni baje, was so rotten it reached out and strangled my very soul. I would only come and say hello and leave for a city that wants to swallow me. I would soon be a graduate. I am coming. I am almost done . I am coming. Who plans for the death of their mother ? Who plans to carry the weight of grief at the beginning of the year and put their mother under the soil and say goodbye .

When people tell me sorry upon my arrival in Lagos, I look lost, I do not understand, is it my mother they are consoling me about? What is this taste I feel in my tongue? Is it rage or grief? There is something that distance does to you, it gives you room for denial but you see being present, acceptance will meet you and you will work with it.

It is quick and immediate, her burial. Traditions must be observed, her body delivered home in a casket like a delivery. A cerémony in the mainland where we celebrate her life and bring exuberant caterers and my wealthy sisters insist we wear extravagant clothes.

I want to argue about the essence of it, but I believe it is okay. Mother was loved when she was alive, she will be loved when dead. There will be a mourning service on the island, where we will cry and walk the streets of Ajegunle and blow the trumpet, marching round as if expecting the walls to fall down flat. The tears shed by people will be a collective one and I will gather them to wash away my anger. I will run around serving the sympathizers small chops, how do you expect them to cry on an empty stomach? I will prepare and be the mediator between my siblings cause everyone has become a sheep without a shepherd. Who will occupy mom’s space ? While I am busy saving the world I won’t be aware of the space grief has taken up. I will smile and grief will look good on me.

Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall All the grief men and all the wise men couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty back together again!.

And after many days, when our sympathizers have gone back to the solemnity of their lives, after they use us as a point of prayer against death. After our accounts have emptied and everyone’s grief has manifested and the grief eaters have collected everyone’s grief but mine. I will go into the solitude of my room, miles away from Lagos that has stolen the one person I loved the most. In the stillness of my blue flooded room, I will remove the wig that has held me all together and my body will come undone and there will be nobody to eat the grief falling from my scalp.

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