Broken Country

by Clare Leslie Hall

With him, for a few hours, I get to be unbroken.

What helps, I have learned, years too late, is to accept responsibility for the things I have done. To be accountable, I suppose.

No one recovers from the death of a child. It’s been 23 years since my son died in a car accident, and I mourn him still. With time and attention, a parent can incorporate grief into part of the story of their life. It is no longer the event around which the rest of their lives are ordered, but an important part, separating before and after.