A Jon Post

It has been one full week since the last time I carried him.

One week since my arms held his small frame, heavy in spirit, slight in body.

Paulo first spoke to me as a jovial interruption to my conversation with his ward-mate, Orlando. Orlando had arrived from a distant town and his doctor had asked me to consider inviting him to Casa Ahava, as his journey with cancer and treatment still had many months, perhaps years, yet to be trod. Paulo’s happy voice butted into my chat with Orlando and I turned to see (not simply look) in his direction. He was a short man, a ready smile found his face as he told me about how hard it has been to live in Urology and how he hoped it would be an easier stay here in the oncology ward. Perhaps it was my laziness, or maybe my impatience but I did not immediately take to Paulo, despite his friendliness. His demeanor eschewed confidence and a right to be heard and I balked at his demands of my attention and respect.

When Orlando came to live at Casa Ahava one week later, I asked him if he liked Paulo and if he would like it if I invited Paulo to come stay here too. You see, though Paulo’s home was comparatively closer than was Orlando’s, the hostility of rural Mozambican roads meant that, for practical purposes, Paulo’s home was inaccessibly far. Orlando’s response, merrily acknowledging Paulo’s penchant for chatter, was to ask in earnest for the invitation to be extended.

So in November of 2021, Paulo came to Casa Ahava and to my family.

His quick wit, his total lack of decorum, and his unwillingness to feel ashamed made him an instant hit.

For those who carry it in their body, Cancer, as an insidious custom, tries to force the trade of dignity and humanity for shame and barbarism. Paulo utterly refused that trade. His insistence on his own dignity, his own worth, and his own voice was unshaken.

But Cancer lingers.

Full of optimism and pride, Paulo visited his herds of cattle and goats over the Christmas and New Year’s holidays. The brutality of the dirt and gravel roads to and from his land returned him to us sick, pained, and weary on his arrival at Casa Ahava in January.

What we knew in test tubes, blood results, and biopsies in November made itself clear in fevers, pain, and fatigue in January: Paulo was dying. In November and December, I had conversed with him about the test results and the abstract of his dying several times. In January, over the haze of opiates and the weariness of blood loss, our conversations were not abstract. In spite of Tramadol’s deleterious effects on the mind and the body, Paulo’s smile remained. When I asked him if he would consider going home to die, he affirmed that while he wanted to die and be buried there, he wanted to stay in Casa Ahava until the doctors at the hospital told him there was nothing left to do.

But dying lingers.

Paulo spiked a fever again but 5 days of IV antibiotics and 3 liters of blood served only to weaken his already weak body. We waited too long. Much like the first day I met him, I sat bedside with Paulo, but this time, his voice was shaky and raspy, not strong and confident.

“Where do you want to die, Paulo? Here in the hospital, or at my home?” I asked him, with tears in my eyes.

He re-affirmed he wanted to go home, if only he could gather the strength for the journey.

I looked him in the eye and said, “Paulo, today you have more strength than you will have tomorrow. Tomorrow, you will have more strength than the day after. Today is as strong as you will feel for the rest of your life. Could you travel the road home, today, now, as you are?”

He smiled…

He smiled at me in his dying.

Because you see…

Dying lingers.

“No, Jon.” He said, “I do not have the strength for that road.”

“Where do you want to die, Paulo? Here in the hospital, or at my home?” I repeated.

“Here, the food is no good, Jon. I want to come to your home and eat xima.” Paulo’s smile was unwavering.

So home he came. It took only 3 days for him to lose the strength to walk. That was the first time I carried him.

One day more for his tongue to forget Portuguese and revert to Shangaan. That was when he started looking for home.

“Ni mooka”, he stammered in Shangaan, “I am going home”. “Ni famba”, again “I am going”.

“Not yet, brother”, I replied in a broken mix of Portuguese and Shangaan, offering the xima and stewed greens he had asked for, not knowing it would turn out to be his last true meal.

But dying lingers.

In delirium and frustration with the loss of his strong body, Paulo tried several times to heave his broken body off the unfamiliar bed in which he found himself. Home, the call of his spirit and internal compass urged him to try again and again. Several times I acceded to his hallucinatory demand to look out the door to his room, around the corner, and try to find home. Into my arms and to my chest he would cling, as he anxiously peered out the door, then, in a confused and frustrated resignation, he would allow me to return him to his bed.

But dying lingers, still.

Seven days, Paulo lay dying on his bed. Death’s scent and weight both lay heavy on his sheets and my skin. Seven days, my wife and I kept watch and bore faithful witness to both the urgency and the latency with which Death lay siege on Paulo’s body and soul.

Ghosts danced in our room.

Saints and ancestors, clouds of witnesses, spirits holy and foul.

But dying lingers, still.

Layne’s gentle hand under his, fingers interlaced, assured him he was not alone nor need he be afraid.

The day he died his eyes returned from the haze of delirium and the liminal space where death and life both overlap, and they met mine; he smiled at me one more time.

That night, in spite of great expense in both time and money, and in an effort to honor his deep desire to die at home and to honor the traditions of their people, his brother and sisters arranged for a vehicle to drive his failing body and fading spirit to their family land. Paulo would go home after all.

So one week ago, I carried him one last time and lay him as gently as I could in that car to begin that journey home.

Dying ceased lingering and found Paulo on that road.

Today I am sitting in the room where Paulo lay dying one week ago. I still smell the death-smell, I still hear his voice, and I still feel his skin against my hands.

My children are playing Legos on the floor.

The window through which Paulo whistled in harmony with a visiting kingfisher is letting light dance across the bed where he lay dying last week. I think my grief is looking for a home in that dancing light; playing across the mattress where my friend lost his voice but not his smile, remembering the weight of him in my arms.

For you see… grief lingers too.

But I’ve come to believe that a man of sorrows, familiar with grief, may linger in places with which he is familiar.

Maybe the places most familiar are somehow akin to the places called home. And if He is at home in a place where we mourn… well, what’s more comforting than being at home with the ones we love?