IWD: Today She Has Nothing Left

Today she has nothing left.

The death of her only child would be enough to tear a hole in a mother’s heart. But she doesn’t have a husband to hold her and cry with her, his death is still so recent as to hurt every day. She has no family to cling to, no job to support her, no hope in this world.

She walks though the streets. The body of her boy lies on a bier where all can see her loss and mourn with her. The sound of crying fills her ears; how many of those tears are genuine or is it only the professional mourners she hired who cry for her son? How many of her own tears are for the young man she has lost and how many fall for her own lost future?

She has nothing left.

Without a son to support her, she cannot live. As a widow she cannot support herself. Her home will be given to her nearest male relative, who might look after her, even if it’s only to save himself the embarrassment of a beggar in the family. She is too old to marry again, even if she should want to. What little money she had has mostly gone to give her son the funeral he deserved. She knows she will survive, but this knowledge feels like a stone in the pit of her stomach. Is survival all she has to look forward to?

She has nothing left. No son. No money. No family. No hope. No future.

She feels a hand on her shoulder. Through her tears she turns to look. It’s a young man, a stranger to her, perhaps he knew her son and wants to offer condolences. In his dark brown eyes there is sadness deep enough to match her own and yet there is no pity for her. Instead, this young teacher looks at her with love and kindness. He walks to the bier and touches it. The bearers stand still in shock, so does everyone else – a teacher of the law choosing to make himself unclean by touching a dead body; this is something no-one has ever seen before.

“Young man, I say to you, get up!”

She has nothing left now, not even her breath. The world seems to swim before her eyes, not through tears but full of possibilities. It isn’t possible. You cannot bring someone back to life just by speaking. No-one would be so cruel as to even pretend that was possible. In each and every way that her life has been unfair to her so far – this would be the most unjust, the most painful.

And yet he sits up. This boy who seconds ago was dead sits up and begins to talk as though he had just been sleeping. This boy whose hair falls over his face as it always has done since he was a kid, whose smile melts his mother’s heart, who looks thinner than he used to but no longer pale or tired as he did when was ill; he sits up and begins to talk.

The bearers lower the bier, one nearly drops it in surprise and confusion. Hands of friends and mourners reach out to help unwrap the burial cloths so he can move. And the teacher reaches out and takes her boys hand and leads him through the crowd to her.

Whispers fill the air, “God has come to help his people.” And she can only stare, her heart beating fast, as the teacher nudges her boy towards her. She puts her arms around him, and pulls him close enough to feel the warmth of his skin and the faint sound of his heart as she lays her head against his chest. It finally hits her. He really is alive and well. She squeezes him tight until he laughs and tells her he might die, again, from lack of air if she doesn’t let go. She is crying and laughing, the feeling of the stone in her centre has been replaced; as though she was filling up with liquid light, pure joy.

She looks away from her son for just a moment, looking for the young man who brought him back. But he, and his disciples are already gone.

She will always be grateful to him. He gave her back her son. He gave her back her life. He has given her everything.

 ~ By Hannah Lewis