I don’t know about you, but the entire month of June, though alive with Pride, empowerment, and celebration, always carries something heavier for me. It’s as if, beneath the surface of all that energy and colour, there’s a quiet, unshakable shadow—the loss of Michael Jackson.
When the unexpected happened in 2009, it didn’t just send ripples through the world—it sent shockwaves. A seismic shift, a global rupture of the senses. People collapsed in the streets. Some rushed to Hollywood Boulevard, gathering around his star, while others made their way to the Apollo Theatre, where his journey to stardom had begun.
Events, vigils, tributes—everything set into motion almost immediately. And yet, for so many of us, the world—our world—stood completely still. While others kept moving forward, we found ourselves frozen in that single, devastating moment.
Michael Jackson was motion itself. His very being was energy, dynamism, speed—whether it was his gravity-defying dance, his unrelenting creative output, or his tours that blurred the borders of continents and cultures. He was an artist who never stopped moving, never stopped evolving, never stopped pushing forward.
And yet, on June 25, 2009, everything did stop. In one moment, the forward momentum of his life came to an abrupt halt. But in another sense, it carried right on.
His music—the soundtrack of entire generations—had a resurgence unlike anything before. The world of academia, which had long resisted taking him seriously, suddenly changed its tune. Cultural critics, music scholars, and public intellectuals began dedicating collections of essays to him. Michael Jackson, the pop star, became Michael Jackson, the cultural force, studied, analyzed, and dissected in ways that, ironically, hadn’t happened when he was alive.
But still, the grief remains. And no amount of commemoration can erase it.
Jackson’s beating heart stopped that day—and in some ways, so did the world’s image of him. Frozen. Preserved. Embalmed in memory. His legacy continues, but that final heartbeat left a space that can never be filled.
The flowers at Forest Lawn are endless. The tributes never stop. But the truth is, they don’t bring him back.
Michael is gone. And though his spirit lives on in music, in movement, in memory, this day is not just about his immortality. It’s about the space he left behind—the empty place that will never be filled, never be replaced, never be forgotten.
June 25th will always be that day for me.