I will begin at the beginning; the commencement being the destruction of my mental health. Consequently, this was my brother’s death.
I have buried and I have lost. Yet never have I died from death, until now. My sibling died on a Tuesday, weeks before his birthday, 16 days before Christmas, 20 days before mom's birthday and 3 weeks and 2 days before the New Year’s start.
One single gunshot shortly before 10 in the morning. The most delicate sound I'd ever heard. Monumental in aftermath, but kind in waking me up, for it wasn't jarring. She screamed his name, followed by one last inaudible wretch. I told mom to get out of the house. She took care of him in life; the least I could do was take care of him in death.
The most detrimental and beginning of my mental health’s decline wasn't seeing his body, it wasn't therapeutically wiping his blood on my skin, nor was it watching the blood seep quietly and violently from his head. The biggest and most painful monster that day was my walking in his room and positively thinking my brother was sleeping. Entering his room and seeing his body positioned in a way that looked much like you as you read this right now. He was sitting up on his bed; head cocked back and held up by the white wall peppered red behind him. I assumed he was cleaning his gun and it simply went off while he slept. End of story, simple as that, brother wake up.
It took the paramedics one half hour before they professed doing everything they could. I thanked them kindly, walked to my mother and with just one look and no words what-so-ever, I told her that her son was gone. Watching your mother mourn a child they gave life to, is simply the most divine form of punishment life can give you, for my mind will never let me forget her screams. Falling to her knees and announcing to the birds that her boy had died; what terror that was.
They brought him down in a dark blue body bag 45 minutes after. With neighbors watching their spectator sport my mother sang "You Are My Sunshine". I whispered Pink Floyd lyrics into his ear.
I hear it every day and night before I rest my head. That gunshot will soar through my mind until my inner workings stop working, this I know.
My mother was 46, I 24 and my brother Mark was 25 when he died. I wish I could say that I've learned something wise that rose from the ashes of his death…That, I have a perspective of betterment since that day. But I am still searching to wake up every morning and take but one breath that is not riddled with pain. The day I can do so will be an accomplishment and maybe a day for imparting wisdom.
Upon my request, sometime in late February of the following year Mark’s ashes were peppered like snowflakes upon the mosaic design of Strawberry Fields in Central Park, NY. A small piece of him lay with the memory of some of rock n’ roll’s greatest. Now and forever, John Lennon, George Harrison and Mark Limbeck have a memorial in the heart of the greatest city in the world, a city in which he always wanted to go. Finally, death took him there…
…You are my sunshine, my only sunshine; you make me happy when skies are grey. You’ll never know dear how much I love you…a black revolver took my brother away.
Victoria Mark
[email protected]
Phoenix, Arizona