Just Because I love You and Miss You

This is a post that I have wanted to do for a long time! 

I wanted to share a couple of thoughts that I have run across the last couple of months that I hope may be helpful for those of us who are moving along the stepping stones of grief right now.

The first thought is a poem that I ran across entitiled "Birdwings" by Rumi.

Your grief for what you've lost lifts a mirror up to where you're bravely working.

Expecting the worst, you look, and instead, here's the joyful face you've been wanting to see.

Your hand opens and closes and opens and closes.  If it were always a fist or always stretched open, you would be paralyzed.

Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding, the two as beautifully balanced and coordinated as bird wings.

This is so simple and so pretty at the same time.  I do feel that grief is very carefully balanced.  I also beleive that it is important to not get paralyzed by the feelings you have.  I find it helpful to try and keep moving it may not always be forward,but keep moving, that has been one of the keys for me personally.

So, my second thought I wanted to share in this post comes from a great book that I read entitiled "Kayak Morning."  This book was recommened to me by one of the mothers in the on-going greif group that I attend.  This bereaved mother lost her son in a very tragic manner.  She is not very vocal in the group so when she spoke up and recommend this book I listened and I am so glad that I did.  The book is a collection of thoughts that a father has while he is kayaking in a creek near his home in Maryland.  The father lost his 38 year old daughter to a sudden and enexpected heart issue.  By profession the author is an essayist for the New York Times, so the book reads a bit like an essay.  But, his thoughts are so sweet and tender and yet so profound and deep it was quite frankly moving for me.  I wanted to share some of his words from the book.

"Last week I had a public conversation with Marsha Norman.  She has a new play about the Sioux in 1890.  It centers on the Ghost Dance, a religious movements developed at the time of the Wounded Knee Massacre, in which U.S. Army troops killed over hundred fifty Lakota Sioux.  The Ghost Dance was also a ritual to raise the dead.  Marsha said the Sioux had a saying:  "The dead are just one song away from the living."'

I really liked that quote.  How beautiful, how simple.  Can our loved ones who have passed away from us really be just one song away?  One thought away?  One tear away?  One prayer away?  One thought away?  One breath away?  Katherine, are you that close?  Are you just one breath away?

The second thought I wanted to share come from the end of the book, these are his closing words of the book.

"Love conquers death.  No celestial jury will bring Amy back to me.  I will not see her either, no matter how others may want me to.  She will not talk to me.  But in the time since she died, I have been aware, every minute, of my love for her.  She lives in my love.  This morning when I climbed into my kayak and headed out, I  knew that I would be going nowhere, as I have been going nowhere for the past two and a half years.  But, my love for my daughter makes somewhere out of nowhere.  In this boat, on this creek, I am moving forward, even as I am moving in circles.  Amy returns in my love, alive and beautiful.  I have her still.

Greif:  The state of mind brought about when love having lost to death, learns to breath beside it.  See also love.

I aim my boat to toward the shore."

My sweet angel Katherine, you are alive in  my love.  You are alive in all of those who love you and miss you.  Farewell my daughter until we meet again.  Farewell, Carry On, All is Well.