Life after a mother — a treatise from a son
Inspired by my own struggles with the loss of a mother, this is the second in a series dubbed Transmissions from Io, using releases from IO Records to tell fictional stories based on Jupiter’s moon — Io.
Drawing Distance
In the years since the fall of our matriarch, the silence that has shrouded life has at times been stifling. It makes its presence felt especially in the moments when despondence sweeps through and kidnaps light; when disorder is the nature of our environment. In these times of distress, her cries from the other side drift across the divide. But hearing them is like trying to kiss away tears in the rain. In those freely-flowing streams of pain we recall better times. We reminisce upon the sweetness of our queen’s effervescent smile. If only to postpone the destruction we face, for a little while.
In the yawning gap between then and now, hope still finds a way to surmount impossible odds. Despite being separated eternally, our bond could never be more evident. Beyond just being a descendant of a queen, I am a measure of her success as a human being. In my flaws we find hints of the very nature of our imperfect existence together. In my strengths we see the refinement of character only made possible by her careful nurture. A mother’s touch; regal yet common, firm and subtle, ethereal but real. No amount of pain from her loss can erase the fact of her persistence through me. No absence in space can eclipse her presence across time. These are the dimensions of our distance. Let me draw you a picture.
Darkest of Hours
Throughout the course of our shared lives, the most regal woman to have ever graced this kingdom with her existence was a force to be reckoned with. Discipline was a paramount pillar of our coexistence. It instilled a profound sense of responsibility beyond self. Her love was full of sacrifices that were as invisible to us then as they seem blinding now. I for one always felt choked in its embrace. Perhaps this misinterpretation was inevitable given my lack of insight. But what I always held onto was a belief that she was unlike any other woman I had met or known. After all, she remains so to this day. A lighthouse for any storm, most visible at its darkest of hours.
Conflict was almost a constant for most of my upbringing. Being loved by her was a tense circumstance: rich with expectations yet met with a stubborn defiance. In her maternal stricture, the structures she created delineated fine elements of my being that only became clear later, after she was no longer with us. In the final months before her March 5 shuttle departure that fateful year 2010, my frustration and anger were overwhelming and difficult to master. Only halfway through high school had I just begun to turn the tide on the endless fighting between us, but Stage 4, cervical cancer and its attendant complications had other ideas. Our diplomacy was never meant to last once the scourge raised its head, gaped its galaxy-sized maw and with hardly a slurp, sucked her away. Not being able to see her in those final moments, I was left to face doubts about the fairness of the God she put so much faith in. The One, had taken my one and only mum when I was finally appreciating her significance. Without a say in the matter of life and death, or access to a final hug as she slipped into eternal rest, I sat up at night wondering if all this was truly for the best.
Years on, I realise that perhaps an absence of light is the only way to truly see the darkness.
Eon Archive
Guidance is rare and difficult to find in the absence of such a maternal power. Substitutes can never be absolute; echoes only feel like imitations. The past has cursed us to remember her vividly in short bursts, yet we are blessed to feel the caress of her touch so long since we felt it last. This paradoxical mix of favour and misfortune has us trapped. When the present we face is but a farce, it offers little reprieve. In the most trying of times, reaching back feels like a desperate grasp at ether, yet, in fact, it is my only chance at even a semblance of remaining intact.
How much one person matters is often reduced to a subjective affair. A mother matters as much as her children and husband loved her. A sister as much as her siblings and father did. But this reduction ignores how unique her very existence was. It discounts the eternity of her soul in a world that continues to spin but shall never offer her replacement. None shall ever be as she was, despite the millions that have joined her as she is. Through the centuries her memory will fade into the cosmos as she did, but never be lost completely. For what is this universe we observe from this desolate moon upon which we found ourselves marooned, but an eon archive...
Drawing Distance (Dycide Remix)
Whispers that follow me from our final moments have become voices I trust. In their failure to exist beyond my mind, they offer a distinction that I can compare to my reality. Thus, by having no shape of their own, these susurrations give form and substance to the realm I wander through. Perhaps the legacy of her absence is in this definition of my presence. Our physical bond severed forms a spiritual bridge that I must traverse to persist. My desolation is the foundation from which I must build for a future without her.
Grief manifests strangely. In the beginning there was a chasm that I could not bear to look into. From within its black expanse, an eternal playback of our greatest moments ran as deep as the eyes could see. Moment after moment across 18 earth years of motherly advice and homemade culinary excellence, interspersed with unforgiving disciplinary tactics and professorial attention to detail; a characteristic laugh that could alter the very hue of a day; embarrassing scenes caused by an open admonishment before friends. Each recollection would add a sparkle to my reflection of her. Her smile beaming across eternity pulls me out of the Slough of Despond on more occasions than is believable. Is grief now a strange source of relief? Has the shortest distance between a point of debilitating pain from loss and uplifting solace from having eternal support become a straight line drawn between the ends of smiling lips?
Eon Archive (Epsilon Interpretation)
Time strips away the pretexts I once used to desecrate her memory. With that erosion, my own idea of self evolved to capture parts I owe to her nurturing and vision. Over the course of many years, I left these portions of my being unattended. They gradually lost vitality, starved of the attention with which they came to be. An unflinching look at my past has unearthed this negligence. It shall no longer continue to hinder progress. She always insisted that looking ahead was the only way to live fully. So I am taking off the blinders with which I wilfully ignored what defines my own path. To see what I am without her, I must accept what I have always been — with her.
To peer into oneself uncompromisingly supersedes the experience of confronting your mirror image. In the depths of you lie tracts of those that have shaped your evolution. Within myself, I have discovered vast reserves of my eternal matriarch. They surpass the genetic inheritance she passed on. They surround the elements of my character I can be proud of. Within their bounds I sense the promise of infinite supply. But it is only through this journey into the frontiers of my being that I could find this undefiled archive. The onus is on me to put its bounty to good use.
Yours in perpetuity,
Evans Mbora Muthee Campbell.
Artwork credit: Polygonia Creations
Muse: Kaf — Drawing Distance EP [IO Records]
