Francis Bean Cobain, the only child of Nirvana guitarist Kurt Cobain, marked today’s 30th anniversary of her father’s death by sharing family photos to her Instagram page.
“In the last 30 years, my ideas around loss have been in a continuous state of metamorphosing,” she captioned the images. “The biggest lesson learned through grieving for almost as long as I’ve been conscious, is that it serves a purpose. The duality of life & death, pain & joy, yin & yang, need to exist along side each other or none of this would have any meaning. It is the impermanent nature of human existence which throws us into the depths of our most authentic lives.”
She was just one-years-old when her father died by an apparent suicide.
The posted photos include a close-up of Kurt Cobain’s hands. In the caption, she said her grandmother told her “you have his hands.” Other pictures depicted her as a child with him. She writes that she wishes she knew him better, including his specific tastes, but is thankful for what she’s learned through the long grieving process.
“Kurt wrote me a letter before I was born. The last line of it reads, ‘Wherever you go or wherever I go, I will always be with you,’” she writes. “He kept this promise because he is present in so many ways. Whether it’s by hearing a song or through the hands we share, in those moments I get to spend a little time with my dad & he feels transcendent.”