faded memory

As I lay awake in bed not able to pinpoint this aching, gnawing feeling I'm having it hits me that I  cannot remember his face.  I am suddenly filled with such immeasurable sadness that my sweet baby boy, who has not yet been gone two years has become so distant a memory that I cannot recall the curve of his face, the fullness of his lips, nor the shape of his nose.  I quickly look to photos of my other children trying to draw up some semblance of an image of him but I have lost it.  I am reminded that he is not here to see all that has happened.  That he is not here to celebrate in the joys our family has celebrated.  He is not here for me to kiss goodnight and tuck in bed.  Life has become so busy and scheduled that I seem to have let him slowly slip away from me, as if it were all a bad dream.   How could I have let his memory fade as if it were the last bit of light burning from a candle to dim to light a room.  A memory that once filled my every waking thought.  How quickly I have settled into being a mother to three children.  BUT I HAVE FOUR CHILDREN I wanted to shout for so long, but that has now been drowned out by the need to be accepted and to keep things clean, without a need to explain and burden someone else with such a sad story.  Why have I let my sweet boy go, how could I move on without even noticing he had ever left my thoughts.  I speak his name often but cannot recall his face.  What a painful feeling it is to love your child whom you cannot hold.  And even now as I watch my sweet baby E's chest rise and fall with each breath I am reminded how truly amazing this life is we have been given.  How sweet and short the time we have here is.   How one day I will see my precious Nathan's face again, and when I do I will know it right away. I carry his memory in my heart always.