There are moments that the words don’t reach

There is suffering too terrible to name

You hold your child as tight as you can

And push away the unimaginable

I went to see Hamilton this afternoon. I purposely avoided watching the version on Disney Plus because I wanted to see the show live in person first. But I knew this song was coming.

The moments when you’re in so deep

It feels easier to just swim down

I distinctly remember the first time I heard it. I was driving to work. Crossing the bridge over the Mississippi and Kelly Clarkson’s version came on the radio. It was two years after Zoey died. Two years after I held her as tight as I could. And pushed away the unimaginable. Until I couldn’t anymore.

And learn to live with the unimaginable.

I sobbed in the car that morning. I’m sure I was a mess by the time I got to work, but the rest of the drive was a blur. How could these lyrics capture it so perfectly? I often wonder how Lin-Manuel Miranda suffered to allow him to express it so profoundly.

Today I sat in the theatre, awaiting that song. And I cried as Eliza held her son. As the sound of his heart stopped. Just as Zoey’s had. I’m glad it was dark in the theatre. And I wondered if anyone else was crying the same way—the way only a parent who held their child as her heart stopped cries.

There are moments that the words don’t reach

There’s a grace too powerful to name

We push away what we can never understand

We push away the unimaginable