When one has faced the possibility of premature death and has seen many walk through the Valley of The Shadow of Death, Easter becomes a really important symbol, especially when we find ourselves mired down in a winter Friday. This has been true for me and because of this I have found myself attracted to reading the words of those that have been in this place also.
The luminous victorious words of people, yet standing in the dark shadows, can cast a blinding radiance of Hope that will fill all our being. In closing, I would like to cite Norman Vincent Peale's reflections on the last words of two individuals that were well known to him, the beloved American pastor who sparked hope in the hearts of millions across nearly ten decades of ministry.
"The longer I live, the more I'm impressed by the greatness of human beings. I think people are positively wonderful; especially those who have absorbed the resurrection spirit. I was asked to call upon a woman who was very ill in the hospital. Upon entering her room, I asked her how she was. I was startled by the directness of her answer. With a rare and beautiful smile she said, "Physically, I must admit, I am not well. But spiritually I'm all right; and mentally, also. I may as well tell you that I am going to die physically."
I looked into her eyes and realized that she was a great soul. I did not, therefore, make the superficial protestation that she was not going to die; she was correct. I shall never forget the serenity, the objectivity with which she approached the event that so many hold in terror. She was like a person making ready to go on a long journey, even a beautiful journey. There was no sense of fear, only sublime trust in the Master."
Peale continues to quote this terminally ill victorious patient who has now gone on to the Golden City and received her inheritance in Christ. "I wanted to see you, not because I particularly need any comfort, but to urge you to keep preaching Christ's message of hope and faith, to keep on telling people that if they find Jesus Christ and have a close relationship with Him, He will help them in every way." She smiled radiantly at him, once again. "He is so close to me. I have no fear of life; I have no fear of death."
Peale stood at her bed, knowing he would not see her again and said to her "I salute you as a very great lady, one of the greatest I have ever known. You have no fear of life; you have no fear of death. Therefore, you have won the greatest of all possible victories. Wherever you go in the vest reaches of eternity, Jesus Christ will be with you."
On another occasion Peale received an astounding letter from a man telling him of his father's death. I don't believe any other religious system of thought or experience other than Easter Promise of the Christian tradition could honestly be expected to reproduce the hope and victory of this man's death bed experience. Perhaps this letter should be put up in every hospital, hospice, and home in America.
"My father experienced the transition yesterday. He looked at the transition as being a wonderful and glorious event. He told us several times after learning from the doctors of his serious condition, 'Boys, I am about to have the greatest experience a man can have, either way it turns out. If God sees fit to heal me, I will be in a position to be a great witness to Christ, having gone down to the valley and then back up again. On the other hand, if God calls me home, I will have the greatest experience in life. And so I will win, either way you look at it.'"
This same man's father had also written to Peale the following wondrous words of encouragement and faith.
“This is one letter I hate to write to you, and yet it is a joyous letter. About two months ago, the doctors analyzed my condition as a malignant lung, and I've been in the hospital taking cobalt treatments. But life becomes more wonderful every day I live. It is joyous irrespective of the discomfort and pain that are in my body, knowing that I am one with God. I know that He is my Father, and I know that life is eternal and that the spirit of God dwells within me. I am immortal. I am living in immortality now and always will be.”
Does it get any better than this? These patients KNEW where they were going. Peale had a good idea then and now knows it for himself, having ended his earthly travels several years ago.
His wife Ruth of many years has recently compiled much of his unpublished writings and sermons. In these he left these final words.
“If people will surrender their lives to Jesus Christ, they will have eternal life. I know it as a fact. For when Easter really happens to you, you enter into one of the most subtle realizations in all the world, namely, that your loved one who are physically gone from this earth, and you, yourself, are citizens of a dynamic universe, a universe that is not material but spiritual.”
"I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die."
Friday, February 8, 2008
Seeing Beyond Depression and Fear
With the radical disruption of traditions and relationships in the American culture and the onslaught of fast paced change, the resultant anxiety has cast many into deep depression. My county was surveyed recently and nearly two out of three people living in the county are struggling with some aspects of depression. The New Testament tells us that One has come for those that are poor in spirit.
"Thief" describes the robbery of life's spirit by depression. While in the produce section of a grocery story on a bright Sunday afternoon I observed several people in the depths of depression, unable to see the cerulean brilliance of an October day. Yet, for them there are Possibilities.
There are those times when life seems so black and we feel so "Dejected" that we have no choice but to fly by the instruments of faith. It was only in the darkness of night that the wise men were able to follow His star. In "Fear II" we are reminded that stars only shimmer where there is complete darkness.
One day we will be called home, invited to our "Homecoming." There we will leave behind our fears, forgetting only our pain, and learning all the secrets of the universe.
In the depths of depression we often experience a powerful sense of worthlessness, a sense that we don't deserve good things from life. "Thief II" is a reminder of that first Easter, long ago, which established our great value in God's sight. The redemptive work completed at that first Easter season makes us eternal heirs to all good things in Heaven. In heaven their will be no TV dinners.
"Advocate" speak to the great strength we can gain from our friendships when setting out on a final journey to Eternity or continuing a journey alone. With the enablement of another, sharing complementary strengths, one can reach the stars. "Advocate" speaks of the time a dear friend prayed for me during an important milestone in my life.
Thief
Wandering among succulent possibilities,
your path crosses mine, giving me pause.
Wondering where your journey has taken you,
I search your face for life's igniting spark.
In unguarded moments, glistening with sadness,
your melancholy eyes reveal a ransacked soul.
Joy fills radiant afternoons of Indian summer,
yet your heart has been robbed of jubilation.
Astral brilliance fills empyrean canopies,
yet your spirit shivers in frigid shadow.
Once dancing to cosmic euphonies;
your life's melody has been plundered
Once you giggled with child-like glee.
Depression's malefactor has stolen hope.
Hearing only the solitude of despair,
silence screams with your anguish.
Unto us a child is born.
Dejected
Dusk darkening my disposition,
shadows fill life's valley.
Silently, mist slowly spreads,
shrouding mountains of elation.
Premonitions herald twilight;
a sightless void enfolding me.
Blinded by swirls of gloom,
memories of the Light are forgotten.
Euphoria transmuting to despair,
aureate dreams sublimate to ferrous fear.
Stumbling in disconsolate longing,
blackness conceals the Way.
His star guided them through the night.
Fear II
It's bigger then me.
I can't see around it.
It fills the horizon.
I cower under grim shadow.
It eclipses visions of light.
I can't see the path anymore.
Stumbling, I fell.
Stunned, I lay in darkness.
I looked up.
There in inky blackness stars shimmer.
Homecoming
Easter came today,
melting angst of long winter.
Dogwoods surviving darkness,
azaleas promise temperate days.
Cerulean brilliance eclipsed,
I wondered where the sun went.
Caught in a vortex of fear,
spring failed to warm me.
Uncertain of my place in life,
You invited me to Yours.
Not knowing the way,
You told me transcendent secrets.
I found a parking space.
Thief II
For you, it rains,
stars hidden in fear.
Radiance of Hope fractures,
your tears frozen in pain.
He offered you azure worlds.
You feared His price.
Heir to endless riches, yet,
bankruptcy haunts your soul.
Rare vintages in Baccarat?
You opt for TV dinners.
Order the special.
After all, it's Easter.
Advocate
Flying on the power of your prayer,
my satiated soul soars to secret Places.
A firm Hand sustains my ascension;
defying gravity's inexorable attraction.
Cobalt heavens wax star-studded ebony,
terra firma releasing me to Elysium.
Iridescent wisps in Cygnus beckon,
offering glimpse of nebular Marvels.
Obscuring Orion's opulent mysteries,
your devotion eclipses luminary wonders.
With you I can reach the stars.
"Thief" describes the robbery of life's spirit by depression. While in the produce section of a grocery story on a bright Sunday afternoon I observed several people in the depths of depression, unable to see the cerulean brilliance of an October day. Yet, for them there are Possibilities.
There are those times when life seems so black and we feel so "Dejected" that we have no choice but to fly by the instruments of faith. It was only in the darkness of night that the wise men were able to follow His star. In "Fear II" we are reminded that stars only shimmer where there is complete darkness.
One day we will be called home, invited to our "Homecoming." There we will leave behind our fears, forgetting only our pain, and learning all the secrets of the universe.
In the depths of depression we often experience a powerful sense of worthlessness, a sense that we don't deserve good things from life. "Thief II" is a reminder of that first Easter, long ago, which established our great value in God's sight. The redemptive work completed at that first Easter season makes us eternal heirs to all good things in Heaven. In heaven their will be no TV dinners.
"Advocate" speak to the great strength we can gain from our friendships when setting out on a final journey to Eternity or continuing a journey alone. With the enablement of another, sharing complementary strengths, one can reach the stars. "Advocate" speaks of the time a dear friend prayed for me during an important milestone in my life.
Thief
Wandering among succulent possibilities,
your path crosses mine, giving me pause.
Wondering where your journey has taken you,
I search your face for life's igniting spark.
In unguarded moments, glistening with sadness,
your melancholy eyes reveal a ransacked soul.
Joy fills radiant afternoons of Indian summer,
yet your heart has been robbed of jubilation.
Astral brilliance fills empyrean canopies,
yet your spirit shivers in frigid shadow.
Once dancing to cosmic euphonies;
your life's melody has been plundered
Once you giggled with child-like glee.
Depression's malefactor has stolen hope.
Hearing only the solitude of despair,
silence screams with your anguish.
Unto us a child is born.
Dejected
Dusk darkening my disposition,
shadows fill life's valley.
Silently, mist slowly spreads,
shrouding mountains of elation.
Premonitions herald twilight;
a sightless void enfolding me.
Blinded by swirls of gloom,
memories of the Light are forgotten.
Euphoria transmuting to despair,
aureate dreams sublimate to ferrous fear.
Stumbling in disconsolate longing,
blackness conceals the Way.
His star guided them through the night.
Fear II
It's bigger then me.
I can't see around it.
It fills the horizon.
I cower under grim shadow.
It eclipses visions of light.
I can't see the path anymore.
Stumbling, I fell.
Stunned, I lay in darkness.
I looked up.
There in inky blackness stars shimmer.
Homecoming
Easter came today,
melting angst of long winter.
Dogwoods surviving darkness,
azaleas promise temperate days.
Cerulean brilliance eclipsed,
I wondered where the sun went.
Caught in a vortex of fear,
spring failed to warm me.
Uncertain of my place in life,
You invited me to Yours.
Not knowing the way,
You told me transcendent secrets.
I found a parking space.
Thief II
For you, it rains,
stars hidden in fear.
Radiance of Hope fractures,
your tears frozen in pain.
He offered you azure worlds.
You feared His price.
Heir to endless riches, yet,
bankruptcy haunts your soul.
Rare vintages in Baccarat?
You opt for TV dinners.
Order the special.
After all, it's Easter.
Advocate
Flying on the power of your prayer,
my satiated soul soars to secret Places.
A firm Hand sustains my ascension;
defying gravity's inexorable attraction.
Cobalt heavens wax star-studded ebony,
terra firma releasing me to Elysium.
Iridescent wisps in Cygnus beckon,
offering glimpse of nebular Marvels.
Obscuring Orion's opulent mysteries,
your devotion eclipses luminary wonders.
With you I can reach the stars.
Seeing Beyond The Ravages of Time
One of the most haunting experiences we can have in life is to have the sudden realization that a lot of time has slipped by us. In such a moment our mortality is quite real. Ever looked in a mirror to suddenly see that your wrinkles look like a map of the Martian canals?
I had dinner with a dear friend last night. It's not unusual to eat with a good friend but since I last saw her some twenty five years had slipped in, unnoticed. The last time she saw me I had hair, lots of it. Most of it has now fallen out. Time has been better to her than me. When I was at my uncle's funeral last week, I saw my aunt and I saw that time had stolen all of her hair.
Time has a way of stealing more than our hair. It can steal our memory and health. As a hospice volunteer I visit people in nursing homes and one man had lost all his short term memory ability. "Memory II" describes his experience of this. He didn't know who had eaten the dinner I watched him eat ten minutes ago. "Memory I" describes his intact long-term memories of a dear wife and how these memories fill the forgotten void of his present. "Margaret" tells us how much he loved his wife.
As time drags us towards the winter of life we begin to feel the chill winds and long dark nights. "In Nursing Home" a professor friend of mine agonized with his parents in closing their home and moving them to an institution. They felt victimized by the cycles of time. Four days after the longest night of the year, they experienced the Hope and Promise of Christmas. We are promised that there will come a time when we no longer will experience night and will know no pain.
A high school reunion can be a truly disconcerting experience. At one school the oldest classes were seated down in front at the reunion. These classes were always the smallest. The young don't often realize how good they have it. Time has done it's deed. So has the One Who made Easter a reality.
In a world of radical and sudden change it seems nothing is the same any more. "Sentinels" reminds us that some things do go on a long time, giving a sense of security. The everlasting love of God is one of these things.
Memory I
Remembrance of her face,
ignites sweet recognition,
my heart leaping with joy.
Grand treasures from the past,
recalled in pleasing recollection,
bring wealth to my present poverty.
Distant lives from long ago,
uncrowded by today's living,
fill the void of forgotten loss.
Optimism, aureate hope of youth;
permeating timeless wanderings,
gilds ferrous forgetfulness.
What year did you say it is?
Memory II
What place is this?
How long have I been here?
Do they feed me here?
Do they feed me here?
Who are you?
What place is this?
Did I pay for meals?
What year is it?
Who ate my dinner?
Who are you?
Do they feed me here?
Who are you?
Thanks for coming.
Margaret
I went to visit Ned today.
He was in a new room.
It took me a long time to find him.
His memory is not so good.
He thinks he remembers me.
He offered me a chair.
Your picture was on the table.
It was hard for me to pay attention.
Ned remembered your name.
Your smile reached across the years.
Ned was a blessed man.
Your smile is timeless.
Married fifty six years to you, Ned said.
Met you at summer tent meeting.
He remembered it exact.
He thought your picture made in the 30s.
Your halide image froze in time.
I would have guessed this year.
You don’t know me
I arrived six decades late,
I regret my tardiness.
Ned says you've been gone eight years.
His days seem kind of empty.
You will soon be a great grandmother.
Ned’s doing okay, considering.
Nursing Home
The shadows dance on the walk,
a silent requiem for what once was.
Shuffling forward, to the aseptic unknown,
you leave behind myriad memories.
Four decades of joys, tears, laughs;
sold to the highest bidder.
Supper arrives in a plastic tray,
erasing remembrance of Wedgewood.
Leaves fall, exposing the leaden sky,
Autumn has turned to winter.
Is it true, autumn colors really end?
Mercifully, you never did know.
The bitterness of winter has come to you,
wind, uncertainty, the unknown howling.
Christmas comes in winter
Sentinel
Short-lived are the affairs of men,
in mere decades they are lost to memory.
For but a season do we dash about,
strutting our imagined self-importance.
In warming spring, we claim immortality.
Chilling autumn brings mortal reality.
In your sacred forests is shelter;
promising safety from ravages of winter.
For centuries, you have been rooted,
withstanding onslaughts of uncounted years.
Quietly, you stand tall over us,
pointing to a Higher Way of life.
Quiet whispers of your arboreal canopy shout.
He Who was before the foundations of time is.
In Him, the sands need never fail.
High School Reunion
The oldest sit up in front.
There aren't very many there.
The men don't come much any more.
I used to sit far in back, wondering.
Would I ever sit up in front?
It's a long way down there.
Far in the back I dreamed.
Some day I would be in the lights.
Up in front.
The lights are bright here.
I can't find my dreams anymore.
My bifocals aren't so good now.
How did I get here?
It's a long way down here, up in front.
I don't remember coming.
Would you like to sit down?
I had dinner with a dear friend last night. It's not unusual to eat with a good friend but since I last saw her some twenty five years had slipped in, unnoticed. The last time she saw me I had hair, lots of it. Most of it has now fallen out. Time has been better to her than me. When I was at my uncle's funeral last week, I saw my aunt and I saw that time had stolen all of her hair.
Time has a way of stealing more than our hair. It can steal our memory and health. As a hospice volunteer I visit people in nursing homes and one man had lost all his short term memory ability. "Memory II" describes his experience of this. He didn't know who had eaten the dinner I watched him eat ten minutes ago. "Memory I" describes his intact long-term memories of a dear wife and how these memories fill the forgotten void of his present. "Margaret" tells us how much he loved his wife.
As time drags us towards the winter of life we begin to feel the chill winds and long dark nights. "In Nursing Home" a professor friend of mine agonized with his parents in closing their home and moving them to an institution. They felt victimized by the cycles of time. Four days after the longest night of the year, they experienced the Hope and Promise of Christmas. We are promised that there will come a time when we no longer will experience night and will know no pain.
A high school reunion can be a truly disconcerting experience. At one school the oldest classes were seated down in front at the reunion. These classes were always the smallest. The young don't often realize how good they have it. Time has done it's deed. So has the One Who made Easter a reality.
In a world of radical and sudden change it seems nothing is the same any more. "Sentinels" reminds us that some things do go on a long time, giving a sense of security. The everlasting love of God is one of these things.
Memory I
Remembrance of her face,
ignites sweet recognition,
my heart leaping with joy.
Grand treasures from the past,
recalled in pleasing recollection,
bring wealth to my present poverty.
Distant lives from long ago,
uncrowded by today's living,
fill the void of forgotten loss.
Optimism, aureate hope of youth;
permeating timeless wanderings,
gilds ferrous forgetfulness.
What year did you say it is?
Memory II
What place is this?
How long have I been here?
Do they feed me here?
Do they feed me here?
Who are you?
What place is this?
Did I pay for meals?
What year is it?
Who ate my dinner?
Who are you?
Do they feed me here?
Who are you?
Thanks for coming.
Margaret
I went to visit Ned today.
He was in a new room.
It took me a long time to find him.
His memory is not so good.
He thinks he remembers me.
He offered me a chair.
Your picture was on the table.
It was hard for me to pay attention.
Ned remembered your name.
Your smile reached across the years.
Ned was a blessed man.
Your smile is timeless.
Married fifty six years to you, Ned said.
Met you at summer tent meeting.
He remembered it exact.
He thought your picture made in the 30s.
Your halide image froze in time.
I would have guessed this year.
You don’t know me
I arrived six decades late,
I regret my tardiness.
Ned says you've been gone eight years.
His days seem kind of empty.
You will soon be a great grandmother.
Ned’s doing okay, considering.
Nursing Home
The shadows dance on the walk,
a silent requiem for what once was.
Shuffling forward, to the aseptic unknown,
you leave behind myriad memories.
Four decades of joys, tears, laughs;
sold to the highest bidder.
Supper arrives in a plastic tray,
erasing remembrance of Wedgewood.
Leaves fall, exposing the leaden sky,
Autumn has turned to winter.
Is it true, autumn colors really end?
Mercifully, you never did know.
The bitterness of winter has come to you,
wind, uncertainty, the unknown howling.
Christmas comes in winter
Sentinel
Short-lived are the affairs of men,
in mere decades they are lost to memory.
For but a season do we dash about,
strutting our imagined self-importance.
In warming spring, we claim immortality.
Chilling autumn brings mortal reality.
In your sacred forests is shelter;
promising safety from ravages of winter.
For centuries, you have been rooted,
withstanding onslaughts of uncounted years.
Quietly, you stand tall over us,
pointing to a Higher Way of life.
Quiet whispers of your arboreal canopy shout.
He Who was before the foundations of time is.
In Him, the sands need never fail.
High School Reunion
The oldest sit up in front.
There aren't very many there.
The men don't come much any more.
I used to sit far in back, wondering.
Would I ever sit up in front?
It's a long way down there.
Far in the back I dreamed.
Some day I would be in the lights.
Up in front.
The lights are bright here.
I can't find my dreams anymore.
My bifocals aren't so good now.
How did I get here?
It's a long way down here, up in front.
I don't remember coming.
Would you like to sit down?
Seeing Beyond Catastrophic Illness
A year after I met Susie I met Elaine who was called to make a difficult journey with melanoma as a travelling companion. "Hoax" speaks of the illusion of finality that death has for us on this side. Lazarus found out about this illusion. A month ago Elaine finished her journey.
There are those luscious inspiring times when we meet someone who has beaten catastrophic illness and gone on to accomplish truly great things in spite of their handicaps. There is not a disease in existence than someone has not been able to beat it. "Comeback" and "Bike Trip" and "Starting Gate" describe the victorious life of a woman, Diane Golden, who had by the age of twelve lost a leg to cancer and during her twenties suffered through two mastectomies and a hysterectomy. I was numb with wonder for days after hearing her speak.
"Respirator" describes another man who was struck down by polio while in medical school. In spite of being fully paralyzed and confined permanently to an iron lung, he was able to complete his training, marry, and carry on a medical practice for forty years. He has had a difficult but truly inspiring journey. One day he will not need his respirator.
A dear friend of mine had one of her close friends critically burned in an industrial accident last year. My friend Elaine went 150 miles each way to tend to Ron while he was in a specialized burn unit in the hospital. His recovery was quite remarkable in its completeness and brevity. "Civility" tells why.
I was put in the situation two years ago of having to tell my dearest friend of the death of a young child in her care. Circumstances necessitated my delaying the telling of this information for two hours. "Ignorance" captures a different perspective on not knowing. Sometimes ignorance is bliss, at least for a while.
Have you ever been in a simply horrific circumstance and found it was suddenly greatly relieved by the simple touch of a gentle hand or the whisper of a kind word? "Empath" describes one who is completely able to identify with the needs and challenges of another. You won't find the word 'empath' in the dictionary.
One afternoon, Rita, who likes to describe herself as my Italian mama was brought to the hospital. That evening at dusk I was called at my office in the hospital to be advised it was suspected she had hepatic carcinoma (not a good thing at all). The ominous "Silhouette" of the hospital against the fading light of day sparked my musing for her. She beat the pronouncements and is well today.
"Prognosis" describes that black eclipsing of the soul that occurs when a physician tells you very grim news. The day becomes cold and windy, warmth of summer quickly forgotten. Yet in the darkness, magic can happen. "Silver Lining" describes some of the magic that Nancy found after having faced grim pronouncements from physicians.
"Fountain" reminds us that in our dark hours we thrive on hope. After hearing a dreaded pronouncement from a physician I often gained renewal beside a fountain inside a tropical conservatory. Today I bask in health. The possibility is there for you as well, when you cast in your offering of hope.
Perhaps the greatest challenge we face is the radical loss of health; the companionship of physical and emotional pain. "Currents" characterizes the uncertainty of life, yet there is a promise of hope as we are carried through life's currents; sometimes being thrown on the rocks of severe illness or relational loss.
"Tumor" portrays the perceived finality of neoplasm run amok in our bodies. Susie and Elaine lost their battles to tumors but their Hope, and mine, says they won the war.
"Virus" describes the emotional and physical carnage that occurs when a viral epidemic sweeps through equatorial Africa. Unseen, unknown, they transform tranquility into horror. Yet, Hope has a place in the viral battlefields of Africa. Belgian nuns died for that Hope in Kenya, fighting disease. They now have permanent immunity.
Hoax
Three weeks ago I met you for the first time. It was late afternoon on one of those impossibly glorious early spring days; vibrant life bursting forth after a long harsh winter. You were the perfect hostess. I was amazed. I had heard you were quite ill, fighting the big one that starts with ‘C’. I couldn't tell. You were too busy living to be sick. I remember that fine meal you made for us, even what you served. Of course, dessert was best. But it always is, isn't it? It seems like the best often comes at the end.
It is still spring. The dogwoods are finished but the azaleas are still looking pretty good. Impatiens are my favorite and they are just starting out, real well. The air conditioner actually came on today. I could lament the high power bill but it’s probably better to celebrate late summer evenings, long walks, and kids frolicking in swimming pools.
Is it right the docs are telling you their bag of tricks is almost empty? You sounded ... so different ... today. I hope you aren't listening to those soothsayers. They have a way of reducing people to statistics. They would make great gamblers; they seem to know numbers. Since when have Life and Hope depended on playing a numbers game?
Ask Lazarus sometime about beating the odds. He knows.
Bike Trip
Mother told me I couldn't do it.
It was foolish to try.
My fear said she was probably right.
Yes, my bike has only one pedal.
I don't have use for another one.
I don't wear but one shoe.
You saw past my limitations.
You believed in my potential.
You wanted me to accept it.
You invited me into life's adventure.
The hills got hard, too hard.
You kept believing.
After the climb, we coasted.
Comeback
Neoplastic blindness brought darkness,
embracing you in cancerous terrors.
Shrouds of gloom eclipsing childhood glee,
carefree memories passed into forgetfulness.
Another, seeing beyond dismal shadows,
illuminated possibilities in your soul.
Confident in your inner visions,
He gave you safe passage to new life.
Sightless, you rode into sunlight,
trusting the hand of your Champion.
Believing in Him, you basked in warmth,
knowing safety in His unfailing strength.
For many seasons the sun shone on you,
then monsoons of mitogenic horror returned.
You fell again, your dream lacerated,
malignant monsters menacing once more.
For another winter, hope frozen in fear,
you shivered in shadows of despair.
A warm hand reaching out, extending,
sought you out in your inner agonies.
He who balanced you in blackest night,
lifted you again onto a seat of Hope.
Before foundations of time it was promised,
He would lift you unto a secure place.
I learned you will cycle in the Olympics,
guided by the unerring torch of His love.
Faith is the promise of things yet unseen.
Currents
We wade into life's uncertain waters,
forfeiting security in firm foundations.
Buoyant with frivolity, faith, fantasy;
Fate carries us beyond archived memory.
Reliving adolescent arboreal adventures,
we leap into the river's enfolding embrace.
Hand in hand we drift onward, downward;
above, dappled canopies resonating with song.
Iridescent impossibilities, curious, inquiring,
show off their airborne entomologic wonders.
Distant thunder, barely audible, quietly screams;
sun-drenched tranquility dispersed by foreboding.
Reality sweeps us into frenzied free fall,
lacerating us on scabrous edges of cold terror.
Neoplastic swirls pulling you under,
I struggle to revive you with Hope.
White water inundating your soul,
we cling to a Promise of still waters.
Evening Star reflected in dusky stillness,
malignant despair transmutes to serenity.
The hoot owl is silent.
Civility
In horrors of darkest pain,
Your voice was there, soothing.
In vast loneliness of despair,
You held his hand, giving Hope.
With warmth of compassionate heart,
You brought him back from the brink.
In grim darkness of thermal anguish,
You filled him with life's radiance.
They say he healed rather quickly.
I don't wonder why this was so.
The best medicines are free.
Empath
Frigid winds blow away warmth of summer,
constellations of future dreams frozen in fear.
Azure skies of contentment give way;
twilight crowding out brilliance of day.
Starless night cloaks my sightless soul,
visions of life pushed beyond memory's edge.
Stumbling in terminal shadows of anguish,
searing pain blinds my fearful eyes to life.
Travelling alone into that uncharted valley,
vast loneliness isolates me from the living.
The dissonance of my silent suffering pausing,
Your Compassionate Presence enters the abyss with me.
Journeying into the horrors of my pain,
sympathetic sentience stirs in Your Soul.
I pause from my tribulations with wonderment,
Your shared torment easing the burden of letting go.
Healing words pushing back malignant despair,
glints of love in Your eyes dispel inner blackness.
In the refreshment of Your tears,
a healing possibility sprouts in my heart.
You will meet me there?
Fountain
In profound darkness we walked;
tribulation of uncertainty before us.
Pain masking brilliance of day,
You were there in our shared gloom.
Frolicking in Your effervescent flow,
feathered messengers chirped assurance.
Myriad coins of the realm glisten;
offerings for unspoken dreams.
In poverty of spirit we made a gift,
mingling secrets with those of others.
Basking in Your alabaster basins,
we shared sumptuous refreshment.
In the tumult of Your cascade,
a sprout of Hope was watered.
My wish has come true.
Ignorance
Smiling, laughing into unlived eras,
your optimism thrives on the unknown.
Placid waters before your bow,
your nescience nurtures Numinous Mercy.
Your future breaking through to my present,
I alone fear turbulence cast before you.
An intermediary in time confronting me,
makes me harbinger of impending anguish.
Cosmic wonders eclipsed by tempest,
circadian darkness mocks imminent pain.
As custodian of somber knowledge,
I grieve for your trials, yet endured.
I bless you with innocence a bit longer,
for sufficient are the cares of today.
Silver Lining
Your name provokes malignant dread,
chasing tranquility into yesterday's dreams.
Neoplastic anxiety contaminates day,
transmuting dazzling brilliance to ominous shadow.
White-coated harbingers of pronouncement,
proclaim your morbid knock at my door.
Searing winds of uncertainty leave me breathless,
teetering, falling back, crying, grieving.
Sleepless nights drive me to exhausted slumber,
cooling incendiary fears of your wrath.
***
Night gives way to dawn's translucence,
illuminating thunderheads of trepidation.
Afternoon showers refreshing my wounded soul,
sprouts of possibility rise in the ashes of my future.
Transected by solar fires, clouds yield,
entrancing me with grand cerulean majesty.
Cosmic jewels mark the Way in coming night,
constellations of friends holding my hands.
Cancer, you have opened my heart to life.
Prognosis
Tropical summer breezes cooling cobalt heavens,
delectate contentment warms my satiated soul.
Feathered celebrants sing melodies of life;
effervescent ocean waves of gentle renewal.
Crustacean curiosities scamper before me,
dancing on sands of crystalline brilliance.
Frolicking in foamy fantasy,
my feet create motifs of jubilation.
Tomorrow holds aureate possibilities,
faith stemming from today's sterling reality.
***
Unnoticed, small harbingers form at empyrean edge,
scudding across the burnished skies of being.
Standing before your throne of judgement,
frigid fear freezes my heart mid-beat.
Overflowed by the thunder of your words,
breakers of dread plunge me in darkness.
Swells of apprehension agitate my spirit;
mottled with panic, hope, anguish, pleas.
Setting sun sends chills through me,
ominous certainty of demise before me.
In the astral diamonds of blackest night,
His glittering Hope is made manifest.
Respirator
Shadow creeps across your spirit,
uncertainty crystallizing in your soul.
Your heart throbbing with dark foreboding,
sacred sleep has been driven from night.
In darkness of night you cry out in loss,
once you danced, made love, laughed, dreamed.
An unseen hideous power robs you,
consigning you to prisons of stillness.
Your sinews rendered impotent,
blessed breath of life eludes you.
Your days merge into endless winter,
myriad joys of summer nearly forgotten.
Engineers keep you breathing,
their machines mocking your vitality.
In the far recesses of your anguish,
Hope germinates, giving grand possibilities.
He shall wipe away every tear from your eyes,
and there shall no longer be any death; there
shall no longer be any mourning, crying, pain.
Silhouette
Learning of your twilight prognosis,
the hospital's brick pile mocks life.
With sullen hulk eclipsing last light,
winter night's edge obscures hope.
Denizens of pathology dwell within,
proclaiming their morbid horrors.
Interior florescent brilliance, blinding,
drives joy into clandestine shadows.
Dreams, fortunes, fantasies foreclosed;
fear and fright accrue ominous interest.
Sleepless, writhing in abject terror;
you see only abysmal blackness.
Ebony of neoplastic dread transforming;
sapphire possibilities ascend.
The Morning Star rises in the East.
Starting Gate
Barriers of dread escalate within.
Yawning chasms mock my mortal terror.
Time suspended between heaven and earth,
starting guns pronounce grand challenge.
Committed, facing bottomless fear,
I push off, leaving surety behind.
Uncertainty, calamity, risk, possibility;
compete for sanity of weightless soul.
Alpine panorama taking sacred breath,
my lost dreams are resuscitated.
Angst sublimating to catharsis,
life power resonates within me.
Euphoric, navigating neoplastic slopes,
possibilities for victory urge me on.
Descending into malignant abysses,
I found life's highest summits.
They say I am in remission.
Struggle
Putting my feet in Your stirrups,
I relinquish firm faith in myself.
Your dependability unknown to me,
I yield closely coveted control.
Our alpine journey cloaked in mystery,
blissful ignorance masks corporal risk.
Burdened with gravity's persistent pull,
we traverse transcendent towers of granite.
Mere steps from the foreboding abyss,
I fight down urges to take the reins.
Inner urges to not believe in You
are as compelling as the chasm is deep.
Fighting fulminant fear of letting go,
we ascend beyond leaden clouds of doubt.
In my own strength I wandered below,
shivering in gray rains of fearfulness.
Trusting in you, not knowing you,
you carry me to grand cerulean vistas.
With You, I can do all things.
Tumor
They tell us you will win,
that the odds are in your favor:
Glioblastoma 98%, life 2%.
For now we empower you with our fear, our pain.
We anguish for those that you have beaten;
those cut down in their springtime.
My young flower spends her day in darkness,
yet the sun brightly shines.
You gloat over your cruel victory.
You tell us to live a life of dread, of fear,
to know only hopelessness, loss, pain.
Another came to tell us "I come that you might have life,
that you might have it abundantly."
He says "And the dead shall rise again."
My flower will bloom again ...
again ...
again ...
Tumor, you have lost!
Virus
Your virulence diminishes equatorial brilliance,
driving us into fearful darkness.
Tropical abundance, exuberant with life,
is silenced in dreaded anticipation.
Unseen, barely alive, without thought,
you crash through the canopy of life.
Invisible harbingers of hopeless horror,
you transmute hope to anguish and pain,
Your crystalline matrix making mockery,
transfigures vitality to languor.
With reckless abandon you vanquish,
only to perish in your carnage of greed.
Fragrant whispers of Hope sooth my soul,
speaking of Something beyond heinous horror.
A still small Voice speaks of One,
who has prepared a Place for me,
in the presence of my enemies.
There are those luscious inspiring times when we meet someone who has beaten catastrophic illness and gone on to accomplish truly great things in spite of their handicaps. There is not a disease in existence than someone has not been able to beat it. "Comeback" and "Bike Trip" and "Starting Gate" describe the victorious life of a woman, Diane Golden, who had by the age of twelve lost a leg to cancer and during her twenties suffered through two mastectomies and a hysterectomy. I was numb with wonder for days after hearing her speak.
"Respirator" describes another man who was struck down by polio while in medical school. In spite of being fully paralyzed and confined permanently to an iron lung, he was able to complete his training, marry, and carry on a medical practice for forty years. He has had a difficult but truly inspiring journey. One day he will not need his respirator.
A dear friend of mine had one of her close friends critically burned in an industrial accident last year. My friend Elaine went 150 miles each way to tend to Ron while he was in a specialized burn unit in the hospital. His recovery was quite remarkable in its completeness and brevity. "Civility" tells why.
I was put in the situation two years ago of having to tell my dearest friend of the death of a young child in her care. Circumstances necessitated my delaying the telling of this information for two hours. "Ignorance" captures a different perspective on not knowing. Sometimes ignorance is bliss, at least for a while.
Have you ever been in a simply horrific circumstance and found it was suddenly greatly relieved by the simple touch of a gentle hand or the whisper of a kind word? "Empath" describes one who is completely able to identify with the needs and challenges of another. You won't find the word 'empath' in the dictionary.
One afternoon, Rita, who likes to describe herself as my Italian mama was brought to the hospital. That evening at dusk I was called at my office in the hospital to be advised it was suspected she had hepatic carcinoma (not a good thing at all). The ominous "Silhouette" of the hospital against the fading light of day sparked my musing for her. She beat the pronouncements and is well today.
"Prognosis" describes that black eclipsing of the soul that occurs when a physician tells you very grim news. The day becomes cold and windy, warmth of summer quickly forgotten. Yet in the darkness, magic can happen. "Silver Lining" describes some of the magic that Nancy found after having faced grim pronouncements from physicians.
"Fountain" reminds us that in our dark hours we thrive on hope. After hearing a dreaded pronouncement from a physician I often gained renewal beside a fountain inside a tropical conservatory. Today I bask in health. The possibility is there for you as well, when you cast in your offering of hope.
Perhaps the greatest challenge we face is the radical loss of health; the companionship of physical and emotional pain. "Currents" characterizes the uncertainty of life, yet there is a promise of hope as we are carried through life's currents; sometimes being thrown on the rocks of severe illness or relational loss.
"Tumor" portrays the perceived finality of neoplasm run amok in our bodies. Susie and Elaine lost their battles to tumors but their Hope, and mine, says they won the war.
"Virus" describes the emotional and physical carnage that occurs when a viral epidemic sweeps through equatorial Africa. Unseen, unknown, they transform tranquility into horror. Yet, Hope has a place in the viral battlefields of Africa. Belgian nuns died for that Hope in Kenya, fighting disease. They now have permanent immunity.
Hoax
Three weeks ago I met you for the first time. It was late afternoon on one of those impossibly glorious early spring days; vibrant life bursting forth after a long harsh winter. You were the perfect hostess. I was amazed. I had heard you were quite ill, fighting the big one that starts with ‘C’. I couldn't tell. You were too busy living to be sick. I remember that fine meal you made for us, even what you served. Of course, dessert was best. But it always is, isn't it? It seems like the best often comes at the end.
It is still spring. The dogwoods are finished but the azaleas are still looking pretty good. Impatiens are my favorite and they are just starting out, real well. The air conditioner actually came on today. I could lament the high power bill but it’s probably better to celebrate late summer evenings, long walks, and kids frolicking in swimming pools.
Is it right the docs are telling you their bag of tricks is almost empty? You sounded ... so different ... today. I hope you aren't listening to those soothsayers. They have a way of reducing people to statistics. They would make great gamblers; they seem to know numbers. Since when have Life and Hope depended on playing a numbers game?
Ask Lazarus sometime about beating the odds. He knows.
Bike Trip
Mother told me I couldn't do it.
It was foolish to try.
My fear said she was probably right.
Yes, my bike has only one pedal.
I don't have use for another one.
I don't wear but one shoe.
You saw past my limitations.
You believed in my potential.
You wanted me to accept it.
You invited me into life's adventure.
The hills got hard, too hard.
You kept believing.
After the climb, we coasted.
Comeback
Neoplastic blindness brought darkness,
embracing you in cancerous terrors.
Shrouds of gloom eclipsing childhood glee,
carefree memories passed into forgetfulness.
Another, seeing beyond dismal shadows,
illuminated possibilities in your soul.
Confident in your inner visions,
He gave you safe passage to new life.
Sightless, you rode into sunlight,
trusting the hand of your Champion.
Believing in Him, you basked in warmth,
knowing safety in His unfailing strength.
For many seasons the sun shone on you,
then monsoons of mitogenic horror returned.
You fell again, your dream lacerated,
malignant monsters menacing once more.
For another winter, hope frozen in fear,
you shivered in shadows of despair.
A warm hand reaching out, extending,
sought you out in your inner agonies.
He who balanced you in blackest night,
lifted you again onto a seat of Hope.
Before foundations of time it was promised,
He would lift you unto a secure place.
I learned you will cycle in the Olympics,
guided by the unerring torch of His love.
Faith is the promise of things yet unseen.
Currents
We wade into life's uncertain waters,
forfeiting security in firm foundations.
Buoyant with frivolity, faith, fantasy;
Fate carries us beyond archived memory.
Reliving adolescent arboreal adventures,
we leap into the river's enfolding embrace.
Hand in hand we drift onward, downward;
above, dappled canopies resonating with song.
Iridescent impossibilities, curious, inquiring,
show off their airborne entomologic wonders.
Distant thunder, barely audible, quietly screams;
sun-drenched tranquility dispersed by foreboding.
Reality sweeps us into frenzied free fall,
lacerating us on scabrous edges of cold terror.
Neoplastic swirls pulling you under,
I struggle to revive you with Hope.
White water inundating your soul,
we cling to a Promise of still waters.
Evening Star reflected in dusky stillness,
malignant despair transmutes to serenity.
The hoot owl is silent.
Civility
In horrors of darkest pain,
Your voice was there, soothing.
In vast loneliness of despair,
You held his hand, giving Hope.
With warmth of compassionate heart,
You brought him back from the brink.
In grim darkness of thermal anguish,
You filled him with life's radiance.
They say he healed rather quickly.
I don't wonder why this was so.
The best medicines are free.
Empath
Frigid winds blow away warmth of summer,
constellations of future dreams frozen in fear.
Azure skies of contentment give way;
twilight crowding out brilliance of day.
Starless night cloaks my sightless soul,
visions of life pushed beyond memory's edge.
Stumbling in terminal shadows of anguish,
searing pain blinds my fearful eyes to life.
Travelling alone into that uncharted valley,
vast loneliness isolates me from the living.
The dissonance of my silent suffering pausing,
Your Compassionate Presence enters the abyss with me.
Journeying into the horrors of my pain,
sympathetic sentience stirs in Your Soul.
I pause from my tribulations with wonderment,
Your shared torment easing the burden of letting go.
Healing words pushing back malignant despair,
glints of love in Your eyes dispel inner blackness.
In the refreshment of Your tears,
a healing possibility sprouts in my heart.
You will meet me there?
Fountain
In profound darkness we walked;
tribulation of uncertainty before us.
Pain masking brilliance of day,
You were there in our shared gloom.
Frolicking in Your effervescent flow,
feathered messengers chirped assurance.
Myriad coins of the realm glisten;
offerings for unspoken dreams.
In poverty of spirit we made a gift,
mingling secrets with those of others.
Basking in Your alabaster basins,
we shared sumptuous refreshment.
In the tumult of Your cascade,
a sprout of Hope was watered.
My wish has come true.
Ignorance
Smiling, laughing into unlived eras,
your optimism thrives on the unknown.
Placid waters before your bow,
your nescience nurtures Numinous Mercy.
Your future breaking through to my present,
I alone fear turbulence cast before you.
An intermediary in time confronting me,
makes me harbinger of impending anguish.
Cosmic wonders eclipsed by tempest,
circadian darkness mocks imminent pain.
As custodian of somber knowledge,
I grieve for your trials, yet endured.
I bless you with innocence a bit longer,
for sufficient are the cares of today.
Silver Lining
Your name provokes malignant dread,
chasing tranquility into yesterday's dreams.
Neoplastic anxiety contaminates day,
transmuting dazzling brilliance to ominous shadow.
White-coated harbingers of pronouncement,
proclaim your morbid knock at my door.
Searing winds of uncertainty leave me breathless,
teetering, falling back, crying, grieving.
Sleepless nights drive me to exhausted slumber,
cooling incendiary fears of your wrath.
***
Night gives way to dawn's translucence,
illuminating thunderheads of trepidation.
Afternoon showers refreshing my wounded soul,
sprouts of possibility rise in the ashes of my future.
Transected by solar fires, clouds yield,
entrancing me with grand cerulean majesty.
Cosmic jewels mark the Way in coming night,
constellations of friends holding my hands.
Cancer, you have opened my heart to life.
Prognosis
Tropical summer breezes cooling cobalt heavens,
delectate contentment warms my satiated soul.
Feathered celebrants sing melodies of life;
effervescent ocean waves of gentle renewal.
Crustacean curiosities scamper before me,
dancing on sands of crystalline brilliance.
Frolicking in foamy fantasy,
my feet create motifs of jubilation.
Tomorrow holds aureate possibilities,
faith stemming from today's sterling reality.
***
Unnoticed, small harbingers form at empyrean edge,
scudding across the burnished skies of being.
Standing before your throne of judgement,
frigid fear freezes my heart mid-beat.
Overflowed by the thunder of your words,
breakers of dread plunge me in darkness.
Swells of apprehension agitate my spirit;
mottled with panic, hope, anguish, pleas.
Setting sun sends chills through me,
ominous certainty of demise before me.
In the astral diamonds of blackest night,
His glittering Hope is made manifest.
Respirator
Shadow creeps across your spirit,
uncertainty crystallizing in your soul.
Your heart throbbing with dark foreboding,
sacred sleep has been driven from night.
In darkness of night you cry out in loss,
once you danced, made love, laughed, dreamed.
An unseen hideous power robs you,
consigning you to prisons of stillness.
Your sinews rendered impotent,
blessed breath of life eludes you.
Your days merge into endless winter,
myriad joys of summer nearly forgotten.
Engineers keep you breathing,
their machines mocking your vitality.
In the far recesses of your anguish,
Hope germinates, giving grand possibilities.
He shall wipe away every tear from your eyes,
and there shall no longer be any death; there
shall no longer be any mourning, crying, pain.
Silhouette
Learning of your twilight prognosis,
the hospital's brick pile mocks life.
With sullen hulk eclipsing last light,
winter night's edge obscures hope.
Denizens of pathology dwell within,
proclaiming their morbid horrors.
Interior florescent brilliance, blinding,
drives joy into clandestine shadows.
Dreams, fortunes, fantasies foreclosed;
fear and fright accrue ominous interest.
Sleepless, writhing in abject terror;
you see only abysmal blackness.
Ebony of neoplastic dread transforming;
sapphire possibilities ascend.
The Morning Star rises in the East.
Starting Gate
Barriers of dread escalate within.
Yawning chasms mock my mortal terror.
Time suspended between heaven and earth,
starting guns pronounce grand challenge.
Committed, facing bottomless fear,
I push off, leaving surety behind.
Uncertainty, calamity, risk, possibility;
compete for sanity of weightless soul.
Alpine panorama taking sacred breath,
my lost dreams are resuscitated.
Angst sublimating to catharsis,
life power resonates within me.
Euphoric, navigating neoplastic slopes,
possibilities for victory urge me on.
Descending into malignant abysses,
I found life's highest summits.
They say I am in remission.
Struggle
Putting my feet in Your stirrups,
I relinquish firm faith in myself.
Your dependability unknown to me,
I yield closely coveted control.
Our alpine journey cloaked in mystery,
blissful ignorance masks corporal risk.
Burdened with gravity's persistent pull,
we traverse transcendent towers of granite.
Mere steps from the foreboding abyss,
I fight down urges to take the reins.
Inner urges to not believe in You
are as compelling as the chasm is deep.
Fighting fulminant fear of letting go,
we ascend beyond leaden clouds of doubt.
In my own strength I wandered below,
shivering in gray rains of fearfulness.
Trusting in you, not knowing you,
you carry me to grand cerulean vistas.
With You, I can do all things.
Tumor
They tell us you will win,
that the odds are in your favor:
Glioblastoma 98%, life 2%.
For now we empower you with our fear, our pain.
We anguish for those that you have beaten;
those cut down in their springtime.
My young flower spends her day in darkness,
yet the sun brightly shines.
You gloat over your cruel victory.
You tell us to live a life of dread, of fear,
to know only hopelessness, loss, pain.
Another came to tell us "I come that you might have life,
that you might have it abundantly."
He says "And the dead shall rise again."
My flower will bloom again ...
again ...
again ...
Tumor, you have lost!
Virus
Your virulence diminishes equatorial brilliance,
driving us into fearful darkness.
Tropical abundance, exuberant with life,
is silenced in dreaded anticipation.
Unseen, barely alive, without thought,
you crash through the canopy of life.
Invisible harbingers of hopeless horror,
you transmute hope to anguish and pain,
Your crystalline matrix making mockery,
transfigures vitality to languor.
With reckless abandon you vanquish,
only to perish in your carnage of greed.
Fragrant whispers of Hope sooth my soul,
speaking of Something beyond heinous horror.
A still small Voice speaks of One,
who has prepared a Place for me,
in the presence of my enemies.
Seeing Beyond the Loss of a Soul Mate
Death is that final destination from which others don't usually come back to tell us it's OK on the other side. Yet, we have in recent years begun to hear many near-death testimonials that can fire our imaginations and give us hope. Others of us obtain our Hope from religious faith that has endured for centuries. Jesus' resurrection from the tomb is one of the most enduring, if not the most enduring, of all stories in the religious traditions
We struggle with the voids left behind by those we love. We worry for their well-being and anguish for the hard journey they made. We struggle with our loneliness. In these times there is opportunity for growth and healing.
"Hairpin Turns" was inspired by the death last week of my favorite uncle. I went to work last Wednesday expecting a normal day. It was not my plan to be in a national cemetery three states away by lunch time. But so it happened and a vast opportunity for growth and healing came to pass on the twists and turns of life.
One day at my office in the hospital, just at quitting time, a fellow employee turned to me in a numb state of shock, having just dropped the phone down on her desk. She asked me to show her the way to the family counselling room where her family had just been told of the death of her beloved uncle. "Family Counseling Room" is a memorial to the pain and healing that took place in that room that day.
"Backhoe" describes my experience at the grave side ceremony of a young friend consigned to the unknown at the age of twenty-three. A backhoe sitting ten feet from the grave made its presence known with its creaking hydraulics. Its operator sat on a tombstone next to it, impatient for us to finish our business so he could go home for the day.
Exactly one year after I stood next to that backhoe I returned to Susie's grave where I found the grass nicely grown in and kids playing softball near by. In "Cemetery" I wrote Susie a last letter.
"Bench" describes an encounter with a memorial bench in a botanical garden where I sat musing about the short life for whom this bench had been given.
Working in a hospital, I'm often in close proximity to calamitous events in the lives of people. One day near the holidays with festive holiday decorations in place, I was sitting in the cafeteria when a "Code 99" announcement over the PA reminded me of the fragility and beauty of life. We call a Code 99 when a patient has gone into cardiac arrest.
One day while driving to the mountains for a Sunday hike I killed a cat on the highway. This is something I have always dreaded doing, especially since I considered cats highly virtuous creatures of civility. In "Lament" I pondered the unknown fates that brought us to the same place in space and time. I wondered if some child cried that night, unable to find a prized pet.
Sometimes the pain is so vast it just obliterates everything in our world and we have a sense of simply melting down. So it was with "Angst."
"Orchid" is the memorial to the linkage Susie and I formed just before she died. My last time with Susie was on a blustery January day in the Orchid house at the botanical gardens. Perhaps her last memories on earth were of orchids. I recall the enchantment she experienced there. "Orchid" proved to be the seed for the first collection of poems that Susie gave me.
Sometimes the best way to deal with really hard circumstances is to laugh hard. Mom requested cremation and we stopped by the funeral home to collect a small copper box containing her ashes which had been placed in a blue velvet bag. "Dear Mom" is the last letter I ever wrote Mom.
A good friend of mine recently returned from his high school reunion where he had found a conspicuous absence of class mates from his class. An alumni magazine listed those that had departed for Eternity. "Alumni News" describes his thoughts on his reunion experience.
"Night Crossing" and "Jet II" were written as memorials to my mother when she died. At the funeral I stood on the chancel steps in the great cathedral and read "Night Crossing" to those assembled. A very dear friend had a fine rose tree sent to me the day after Mom died. The delivery girl told me to be sure to give the tree ash as this "Thorn Tree" would bloom much better.
Hairpin Turns
Five times in about as many months I have casually punched the "play" button on my answering machine to find my life suddenly put on hold. Five times that blinking red harbinger of mortality has announced the death of a family member. Just today, I again punched the button on the answering machine in my office. I soon learned my favorite uncle had just departed for that far away place where even calling cards don't ever work. I also discovered the funeral was in two and a half hours and two hundred and fifty five miles away. It was obvious that getting there in time was an impossibility.
I left work immediately in a leaden, miserable rain, not even stopping by the house to get clothes or toothbrush. Fortunately, I had obtained gas last week and did not need to give precious minutes to getting more. Even thought knowing I didn't have a chance of making it, I probably set a ground speed record for getting between Anderson SC and Chattanooga, TN trying. Have you ever seen a ten-year old Toyota do warp nine? Half way there the windshield wiper motor failed, completely blinding me. Seconds later the rain stopped and never recurred, allowing me to drive the remaining one hundred twenty miles in some degree of safety. As I pulled into the funeral home, a small orange light came on, indicating I was now running on fumes and would soon be walking if I did not do something very soon.
I find myself reflecting on the day as it has unfolded thus far. I started out on my path today headed a specific direction, wanting to get to a single destination, to achieve a particular result. It had been my plan to invest my day in doing an analysis of cardiac patients at the hospital where I work and then going on to the community theater for the evening where I am a volunteer grunt, doing everything from building sets to carrying out the trash. We have an opening night in a week's time and I have a lot to do. Instead, I suddenly find myself rather quickly facing a very different direction, facing death. I didn't plan to square up with death when I got up today, but here I am with my uncle's widow on Ashmore Terrace going for dinner at the cafeteria to have one of those meals that usually happens only when someone dies. I don't think any of us ever plans to embrace death when we arise in the morning. It usually catches us by surprise. Death is often described as being like a thief in the night; very swift, giving no warning.
It occurs to me that life is much like a treacherous mountain road filled with hairpin turns; one filled with anxious moments and surprises. To safely negotiate hairpin turns and continue progressing safely towards our final destination requires that we slow down, often change directions, and be willing to give up our own dream of a level straight-away. If we are unwilling to shift directions and insist on pressing forward on the shortest path, gravity will cast us down into an abyss. If we press forward on our career goals, financial goals, and performance-oriented task lists, we are likely to miss out on much of what is important in life and be cast into a void of missed opportunities for personal growth and relational fulfillment.
It has been my experience to many times drive on some of the most treacherous mountain roads on earth. At the beginning of one such journey we could see our final destination a mere six miles away, across the valley. What we could not see were the hairpin turns embedded in the walls of those volcanic canyons. As we entered the dark shadows, the only thing we could see were the hairpin turns. We never saw Shangri-La again during the entire day. It took fourteen hours to traverse that volcanic vastness on a single unpaved track carved out of the upper reaches of serpentine cliffs. We had to trust the builders of that road knew their way and had completed the passage before us. In the very midst of some profoundly stressful circumstances negotiating that wild place, we were captivated by scenes of unimagined beauty; primeval volcanic valleys cloaked in verdant rain forests illuminated by blazing tropic rainbows. I never would have seen these if I had clung to my own demands for safety, predictability, control, if I had stayed down in the safety of the four-lane. And yes, we did reach our Shangri-La in the darkness of night.
Today I have not negotiated volcanic valleys but I have skirted around the edges of a valley I know I will one day enter fully for myself; the Valley of the Shadow of Death. My uncle went in there for himself on Monday. The rest of us assembled here today are wondering what it is like in there, what is at the far end, and just how bumpy the road is. Not easy things for us to think about, especially being products of a culture that doesn't talk about death and limits grieving to three days of funeral leave.
I had spectacular surprises on that volcanic journey and even as we gathered to "celebrate" death, I made equally splendid discoveries. I discovered four fine cousins I had never known previously and was soon 'mining' their rich histories and swapping e-mail addresses. I found my desperate need for family connection being fulfilled. For several hours we celebrated our shared history and alliance. For the first time in many years, I felt like I had a place, an assemblage of which I was part. It occurred to me how easily I could have missed this if I had not been willing to jettison my plans for the day as originally formulated. When I got that fateful message today I did not think about whether I should come here and spend time with my aunt who has lost her life partner of sixty-two years. I didn't weigh this against the importance of the things on my calendar for today or tomorrow. I simply did it.
I may have a choice about driving on a treacherous mountain road or dropping my plans for the day and going to a funeral. I may cancel my plans for the next hundred days and go on a dream cruise. Yet, there will come a time when I am called to take a voyage and will not be given any options about the arrangements. I will have to face the Valley for myself, as did my uncle. There will be dark shadowy hairpin turns, steep drop-offs, ruts, a lack of guard rails. Most likely, I will be required to make the journey alone. Most often the destination will be out of sight. The journey may be so tortured as to drive from my memory any remembrance of Shangri-La at the far end. As much as I may wish to turn back, it will be impossible. On this single-track road there are no turn-outs or rest areas, no places to turn around.
As ominous as this may sound we can take heart from the most majestic travel brochure ever written: the New Testament. It speaks ever so clearly about the Golden City at the other end of the Valley, with its streets of gold and gates of pearl, a place with no night and no pain. There I will experience an eternity of surprises and discoveries. There we will share one of those feasts that is possible only when we have truly come home. The harsh journey will be instantly forgotten, much as a new mother's pain is submerged in joy. The brochure does warn that the way is narrow but that if we hold onto the Guide's hand we will get there safely. It will be a hard trip for each of us but the destination is tops. I would encourage you to make arrangements in advance with the Guide. Last-minute walk-ups do have a harder time with the journey.
I go to prepare a place for you. If it were not so, I would have told you.
Wake
Suddenly, still silence abounds,
there is time for contemplation.
Screaming voices of achievement yield to
small whispers of quiet reflection.
You regret circadian busyness,
crowding out what could have been.
Tentative in spirit, unsure of your words,
you offer hopeful musings to mourners.
You lay ambrosial flowers on my shrine,
encasing me in retrospective affection.
Passing on, I left you in the fast track.
Aromatic gardens beckon a lane change.
In this redolent parlor of reflection,
a Pathway leads to abundant life.
Let me show you the Way.
Family Counselling Room
Like most hospitals, the one I work in has at least one of these windowless interior voids stashed in an obscure place. For years one can pass by it and not know it's there. Ours is in a rabbit warren of tiny rooms and blind halls behind the Emergency Room. You don't ever want to be told to come to the Family Counselling Room. They don't give out good news in there. Family and friends of victims of auto accidents, gunshots, and heart attacks often have their worst fears realized in the dark recesses of this secret maze.
It was just minutes before quitting time yesterday when I went to tell a co-worker about some newly discovered good fortune of mine. As I entered her office, the phone rang. She was being summoned to this room, as I stood there. She had no idea about this room or where it was. Solemnly, I offered to show her where it is. The nature of it would soon enough be self-evident.
In grim silence we made our way to that far place. We found most of the passageway doors locked but the last one we tried was open. Inside, the labyrinth reverberated with wailing. With uncertainty, Karen knocked on that fateful one labeled 'Family Counselling Room.' Opening the door we experienced a great crescendo of angst and travail. Karen passed into that inner space to encounter that which we spend lifetimes denying.
My navigational services fulfilled, I backed out; retreating to the silent familiar safety of my living world. How could it be that family members are summoned to that unknown place beyond life with no notice or warning? It seemed so brutal. Especially, right at quitting time when the day is supposed to get better, not worse.
In those few seconds when I was suspended in that space between the repugnance of brutal sudden death and the allure of life, I saw something magic. The doorway into that Family Counselling Room revealed people tenaciously living life, ferociously loving each other, and proclaiming someone mattered a whole lot to them. If only I could be so lucky as to have lived a life such that a Family Counselling Room full of people would feel my departure to be a real loss. This fellow was fortunate. He lived right and the room was full.
Backhoe
A dear friend has just flown beyond,
to that place from which postcards never come.
Raw earth, newly dug, squints in the brightness of day,
still used to its subterranean darkness.
You rest, your hydraulics still creaking,
your yellow earth-stained maw downcast.
We survivors take refuge in life,
our young traveller in her mahogany shrine.
The preachers tell us of hope and safety,
the raw still-steaming earth, of brutality.
Family and friends disperse to life,
seeking to believe the message heard.
You consign our young flower to the blackness,
your maw re-filling the earthen void.
The Son has risen, to meet our traveller.
Code 99
Attaching great value to the trivial;
commerce of living consumed me.
Giving little thought to the sacred,
I squandered priceless days of life.
A mere heart beat from the unknown,
I indulged in animated sentience.
Frolicking in spectral delights of Christmas,
I hear announcement of your passing.
Your heart ceasing to pulsate,
I give pause to take thought.
You have taught me about true living.
Cemetery
We came by to see you today but you weren't in. It seems like ages since we last saw you, perhaps a year or more. We haven't heard anything of you and were thinking of you. Thought you might want to know what's been up this past year.
We had a much colder winter than usual, it actually snowed five times. Yeah, here in the south no less! Spring seemed late this year and probably still hasn't showed up in the north. The TV said it snowed in Wisconsin last night. Today is almost like that day last year when we were last together; bright and sunny with the flowers finally claiming victory over winter. There are lots of the yellow ones you like so much. In fact, there is a bunch of yellow roses right here. Not sure who brought them. Maybe your Mom. She seemed to know about them.
We climbed to a really cool glacier field in the Canadian Rockies last August on a horse. Pretty scaring going up a cliff on a feisty beast that seemed more interested in eating than staying alive. But you know about scary stuff, don't you? We got down alive and I wrote a poem about it called "Struggle." A poem? Yeah. I kept wondering if I should get down off that horse and go on my own. It seemed the safer thing to do. I stayed on the horse because I didn't want to let on I was chicken.
I remember how much you liked being outside in green wild places. Your Mom gave me that picture of you on the rocks in the Chatooga River. I keep it here on my desk at work, also with that last letter you wrote me at Valentine's. A bunch of us got to go to the Amazon in October which seemed really wild and really big. We wanted to learn about the medicinal value of the plants growing there. I have given an Amazon program in a bunch of the schools. The kids thought the big snakes the best. I got a picture of a 200 pound Anaconda snake up in the trees. You should have seen the kids go wild. I think you would like to go there sometime. I wonder if they have stuff like the Amazon where you are.
You would like the name thing they put here for you. It has three butterflies carved into the stone. Below the dates it says you were a REAL person. That's for sure. Someone has kept the grass cut and your place looks nice here. The grass is starting to grow in pretty well now from the edges. You would be pleased to know a bunch of kids are nearby playing the first early spring softball game and laughing a lot.
It's really weird, but since you left I keep getting all these poems. I never cared about reading them and certainly had no interest in writing one. I was standing right here a year ago, just after you left, and had the first one come into my head. Since then I have gotten hundreds of them. I made a book of them at Christmas called Orchids. I told the readers about you at the beginning. It seemed that since I got the first one here I should tell people about you. Would you believe I sold them all and don't have any more copies? They seem to really like hearing about you. There is going to be a second book of poems this summer. I wish I could send you copies of these but I don't have an address for you. I think you would like them.
The timing was unreal. I came three hundred miles to see you today and found out on this very day the botanical garden was having its big annual plant sale. Way cool!! I went and got an orchid plant for your Mom and took it to her. She was afraid she would kill it but was glad I had brought it to her. Jan gave me a big book on growing orchids and I told your Mom I would call her and tell her what the book said about keeping them alive. I wanted to get a yellow Orchid but they were too expensive. I got her one with five pure white flowers on it.
Your Mom seems to be doing pretty good. She has had a hard time in the past hasn't she? She has those days where she cries a lot and other days she is able to go do stuff in the garden and laugh a bit. Your step dad seems OK. He was nice to me when I came by to bring your mom the plant. Your brother moved out last week. He is having a hard time with stuff. I think he must miss you a lot and is not sure what to think about your leaving so soon.
Your Mom has kept your room just the way you had it. Your stuff is still all there and no one has messed with it. I remember when I came home from college and they had made my room into a workshop. It felt real bad. Your room looks like you still live in it. That quilt thing your friend made for you is still in the same place on the wall by your bed where you had me hang it up. I haven't seen Heather so can't say how she is for sure. I remember something from your mom a couple months back saying she was doing fine then.
Gotta go now. It's getting dark out here. We miss ya. Hope that things are going OK for you there where you are. Do you guys get e-mail there? I went on-line last month.
CJ
Bench
Riding the electric trolley Sunday afternoon,
I shared joy with others living their dreams.
My day colorized with resplendent blooms,
hopeful expectations paint my aureate future.
This tranquil space, set aside for peace,
enfolds me in shimmering arboreal fantasy.
Walking in sacred cathedrals of spruce,
I came upon a memorial to your life.
Finely crafted wood, embellished with brass,
tells me your short life was of great value.
I wonder what gracious soul loved you;
wanting me to know of your brief sojourn.
What were your favorite comic strips?
Were you a Trekkie? Ever play baseball?
Did you ever fall in enraptured love?
Did you have communion at sunset with another?
Did you find your Way to that far Place,
where night never comes and pain is no more?
Mind if I sit down?
Lament
Solar radiance illuminated your day,
promising hours of frolicking feline fun.
The rising astral pendant gilded my day,
offering omens of actualization and catharsis.
Unknown to us both, our paths converged,
shared ignorance keeping us in summer bliss.
Serpentine ribbons of asphalt beckoning,
I set off for ascendant possibilities.
Greener grass on the other side seducing,
you sprinted across into your destiny.
In the fusion of our fates you faltered,
never seeing the apparition that befell you.
Melancholy shadows darkening my soul,
a young child cries, wondering why.
I couldn't stop in time.
Angst
Far away, tendrils of your heartache
extend darkness in the lingering night.
Cold mist shrouds my soul;
early morning warmth eluding me.
Shared pain galvanizing great grief,
I send prayers of petition Beyond Orion.
Your tears staining our hearts,
I look behind stars for your Comfort.
He answers.
Orchid
You come to me in your hour of great anguish;
the sands are nearly gone from your glass.
Your blossom too, is fading, your spirit heavy,
your pain reminding you of the shortness of time.
I too know loss, my blooms quickly fail;
much of life for me is without color.
I most often being little more than weed,
rarely enchant you with my splendor.
You, a young flower in His image, fearful of fading,
come share in the fragrance of my bloom,
delight in the vibrancy of my spectral outburst.
For a moment, we will share our blooms together,
remember me in your darkness,
it is in darkness we best rest.
We will both bloom again,
I for but a short season,
For you, your sands will never again fail.
The Gardener tends us both.
Calendar
February, the month of love; short and sweet. Valentine's Day. From what I figure, you spent sixty two of them with your childhood sweetheart, snitching Valentine's kisses twenty years before I came to Earth.
I'm sitting here in your kitchen chair, wondering what your second full day there is like; curious to know if you have gotten settled in yet. From the small bits I hear, it's supposed to be pretty easy to get used to the place and anything you could ever need or want is provided by the management. Is this true? The only negative thing I have ever heard is that the road getting up there is often pretty rough, with some really painful bumps and ruts. I trust you were able to avoid the worst parts of it.
From where I am sitting I can see your monthly wall calendar hanging next to the phone. The picture shows a really fine winter scene of snow muffins on a creek flowing past a stately stone grist mill some place in Massachusetts. Life flows on doesn't it?. Birthdays. Annual termite spraying. Lion's Club meetings. Circle dinners. Death. Death? Death?? What's that got to do with life? Why's that word here on your calendar page? The space for Monday the twenty-fourth is filled in with a small uncertain blue script "M. - died." Is that about you?
"Wonderful Life" is written in the square for Thursday the sixth. What's this about? For certain, you had eight-three wonderful years and sixty-two fabulous ones. Your soul mate is in her chair across from me, nodding animated agreement.
Thursday the thirteenth. The square is marked "Lions." Did you really get to Lion's Club just two days before you started that last road trip? You always were a real trooper for the community. I hope you had a good understudy to take over your role. According to this, I notice that you're supposed to attend the Lions meeting tomorrow. I guess someone has told them that you are out of town on an extended trip.
There's a serpentine line starting on the space for Monday the seventeenth, President's Day and ending at Monday the twenty-fourth. "Hospital" is written in the middle of it in that same uncertain blue. I sure hope that wavering line didn't have a lot of pot holes in it. Somehow it seems appropriate for you to start out on President's Day as you were headed for what might be thought of as the ultimate White House.
Is death a bit like child birth? Is the pain forgotten the second the job is finished? I hear that mothers forget their pain in the instant that brand new life proclaims its arrival. Was it this way for you? Was that awful road trip forgotten the minute you saw those majestic gates? Is your pain all gone? Did the One who vanquished death, transforming it into a miraculous gateway to eternity, meet you there?
Remember to write.
Alumni News
I saw your name there.
It was on the list.
I'm certain it was you.
We never knew about the list.
Back then we dreamed.
We were immortal.
No one ever told us.
We believed the lie.
Life lasts forever.
You found out, didn't you?
Winter comes after Indian summer.
Is it cold over there?
We won the conference this year.
19 August, 1996
Dear Mom:
We went by to pick you up for church today and a professional rather proper lady brought you out to meet us. Curiously, we had to sign some papers before they would let you leave with us. I am not sure what I expected but I didn't expect you to be quite as we found you. We weren't really sure how you would want us to act; seeing you in that blue velvet get-up, so we hid behind a bit of comedy. It was hard to keep a straight face when Mark said that you would have to wait out in the car while we went into church. I hope you didn't mind. Don't worry, I managed to avoid cracking an inappropriate smile during the homily when I thought of the dry humor of Mark's one-liner. We actually thought you would have been amused at his fast wit. He may have pushed the envelope a bit with another one of his one-liners, but cut him some slack, he's had a rather bad day, as you might imagine. We had been driving for a while on our way to the church when he said "I don't think I've heard Mom be quiet this long before." It was impossible to not break out into laughter. You may recall you were sitting in the back seat next to me and it had been really quiet in the car.
It's about midnight on Monday. Its strange to think that this is your last night with us, here inside. Mark is scheduled to take you out to Catalina tomorrow for your last trip across the channel. I remember how much you enjoyed that crossing. Today in church I read a story about how much you liked to navigate at the radar and work the radio at night. From what I can tell, those present in the service today really valued hearing this about you.
I am finding some solace in the deep quiet here in the middle of the night. I wandered around in those magnificent, beautiful gardens behind Mark's house for a long time tonight and watched the moon set. You would have rather liked it out there. I went around and touched many of the flowers there, blessing their health. It was a good place to be, yet a sad place tonight. I went to bed without seeing anyone else.
You and I lived so far apart, in so many ways, for so many years. I have a sense of reverence and privilege that for your last night here, we are no longer so far apart and will sleep in the same room. I find on this, your final night here, that I remember the last time I saw you, before you had on that blue velvet we found you in today. You were in that pure white fox coat at the Clemson train station with that mountain of luggage you always carried with you. I never was sure what was in all that stuff. I am glad I have that image of our last time together. I remember you had your hair done up nice. I have happy memories of giving Jan sendoffs from that same small train station in Clemson. Knowing how much you like trains, you would be happy to know that I am helping a kid down the street put together a monster railroad layout. His father let him take over the living room to do this. His mother left three years ago to go the same place you're now headed to.
This seems like it's turning into some ramblings. Just wanted you to have one last note before you left tomorrow. Hope you get a good sleep tonight. I wish you peace and blessing on your trip tomorrow. Oh, by the way, I snitched three red rose buds from one of your flower arrangements at the church when no one was looking. They freshened up nicely when I put them in a decanter I found in our room.
Love,
Craig
Night Crossing
One of the things Mom loved most was yachting. She much preferred the less pretentious term, ‘boating.’ We had many happy memories of dropping anchor at Emerald Bay and Avalon Harbor at Catalina Island off the California coast. A favorite haunt was the Isthmus on the far side of the island. I recall moonlit sorties by dinghy, rafting up with other boats, playing on the sandy beaches. Certainly, some of the grander memories of my growing up were those experiences in those deep blue coastal waters.
One of the high points of Mom’s often difficult life was night cruising in our offshore cruiser to Catalina; her face illuminated by the emerald glow of the radar screen. She enjoyed being navigator and guiding us in the darkness across inky waters. At the mid point of the crossing one is unable to see land in either direction and becomes quite dependent on the compass and radar to provide safe passage at night. In the dense coastal fog that forms after midnight, all that we were able to see by light of day lost its value in the ebony shadows. We had to put our confidence in the instruments.
Mom won’t be making that night cruise any more. Some time ago the boat burned to the water line after an electrical problem and was a total loss. This morning Mom died alone in a hospital room, but she will see those cerulean coastal waters once more as she travels to a far place. At her request, her ashes will be scattered at sea on an August summer day.
The Christian scriptures say that for now we see in a mirror dimly but will one day see with great clarity. A reality for all of us is that we are called to make a final journey on which we are unable to see land either way and are required to trust the instruments. In the turbulent seas of terminal illness and death we have nothing but the compass of Faith and the sextant of Hope, but, they are more than enough. We made that night crossing many times in choppy seas with nothing to go on but a small green blip on a radar screen and a white needle in front of a small luminous ring of numbers. Yet, every time we arrived safely, even when the journey was stormy.
In My Father’s house are many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have told you. I go now to prepare a place for you.
Jet II
My mother experienced the pioneering era of American aviation and was herself a pilot, dancing in the clouds in canvas-covered biplanes. She even shared a hanger with Amelia Earhart. Over the years she saw the advent of commercial air travel, the coming of age of the jet, and even the accession of space flight. Today, soaring above rainbows is profoundly ordinary for millions. Ferocious fare wars are frequently fought in the skies of America. I myself have flown many hundreds of times to the farthest reaches of the globe; often seeing rainbows from the top side.
It seems to be a reality in the human experience that we come into the world free of fears but become all too proficient at collecting them along the way. Mom lost her ascendant visions of alto-cumulus towers and long ago became fearful of flying. No particular reason really, perhaps reading too carefully, too often, about those rare planes that crashed but forgetting about the vast number that never did. In her last years Mom refused to consider air travel and instead opted for Amtrak. On her rare travels from the west coast, Mom would make a trip to the east coast, visiting family along the way. Her last time on Amtrak, fear got the best of Mom and she was put on a plane at New Orleans and returned home. She never ventured out again except to a hospital and doctor’s office building a mile from where she spent her last years.
Mom died today, in that hospital down the street. Much of my childhood was spent in that same hospital visiting her where she was its best customer. Mom has now pushed beyond her greatest fears, leaving pain behind. She’s no longer afraid and has now embarked on taking the ultimate flight, to that place beyond the reach of jet turbine and airfoil. The Christian scriptures say that we “can do all things through Him who strengthens us.” Mom has taken great strides and moved on, leaving us with the grand possibility of flying above our own fears, to reaching a place where we live in confidence assurance of Him who has gone before us. She’s on the other side now and sees that the only thing to really fear is fear itself; the great thief.
God has not give us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind.
Changes
Change, the inevitable seasoning of life,
Today I learn my job may be eliminated.
The cerulean benevolence above
gives way to a leaden tempest.
The state names, the city names;
they are becoming foreign.
My young flower wilts in the torrid heat
of neoplastic frenzy.
There is no one to water her garden.
The botanical delights will in days be
but as solid waste for compost.
The polished mahogany shrine will tomorrow
be consigned to the subterranean darkness.
Another is to join my flower at sunset,
catapulted beyond, leaving the concrete ribbon,
commemorated by the flashing of red, white, and blue,
A procession of thousands passes by,
hurrying to their suburban fortresses,
I join the procession with them.
The fortress is secure,
those within have clung to their frantic living,
someone is calling on the second line of the other phone.
There are thirty-one messages on the machine.
A young man slips through the cracks,
no one is with him in a dark place,
as he wonders where my flower went.
There is a sterling moon,
pendant above the leaden tempest.
The dogwoods are in bloom,
tomorrow a solar celebration will greet them.
Easter is near.
Thorn Tree
It's a cerulean day, unusually cool and splendid for early August here in the deep south. Fresh rains have renewed the grass and gardens, washing away the brittle brown dryness of an arid July, leaving an emerald realm. Even the cat that lets me live with her is spunky after an extended lethargy that cats always have during southern summers. Today my mother is scheduled for cremation, her ashes to be scattered over the blue waters of the Pacific. Of course, it's not something I would wish on anyone, yet there does seem to be an order to the day. Often, we get cards at such times that quote from Ecclesiastes assuring us there is a divine order to the great events of life, especially the real hard ones like death. Like having Mother die alone in a hospital room and being three thousand miles away. You know, I almost believe it.
Today I got a rather fine illustration of an important foundational concept of life; that in dying, there is newness of life. We all know that corn must dry out and die down to seed to give rise to next year's corn and that this is true for all living plants. We would never appreciate the beauty of azaleas if they stayed in bloom all year. We would never cherish spring if it were not preceded by harsh winter. One of the great struggles of the human experience is learning to appreciate things before we lose them. This is often tragically true in the death of family members. Even so, in the ashen sorrow of death opportunity presents itself for renewal. In the two short days since Mother's passing, there has been renewal between those estranged for years, appreciating those things once depreciated. In our living we experienced much challenge and difficulty. In mom's death and dying and the settling of her affairs there has been grand calmness, order, and civility. We are discovering diamonds in our own midst.
Two days after Mother died I was at home when the doorbell was rung, heralding a delivery. Normally, I'm not home during the day but my employer graciously suggested I take off several days to work through this time of transition and loss. On the porch was a large empty‑handed woman saying she had a delivery for me and asking if I wanted it outside or in the house. 'It' turned out to be a large Jackson and Perkins rose tree; a variety called 'double delight.' I told her one of my very favorite things to do when I went to Birmingham every month was to visit the rose gardens in the arboretum. Looking at the card I saw that this elegant symbol of life was, in fact, from the very one I so often walk with in those fine rose gardens. I asked the delivery woman what I needed to do in order to assure its survival and blooming. She said "Be sure to put ashes in the soil and water every day."
We can complain that roses have thorns or we can be thankful that thorn bushes have roses.
We struggle with the voids left behind by those we love. We worry for their well-being and anguish for the hard journey they made. We struggle with our loneliness. In these times there is opportunity for growth and healing.
"Hairpin Turns" was inspired by the death last week of my favorite uncle. I went to work last Wednesday expecting a normal day. It was not my plan to be in a national cemetery three states away by lunch time. But so it happened and a vast opportunity for growth and healing came to pass on the twists and turns of life.
One day at my office in the hospital, just at quitting time, a fellow employee turned to me in a numb state of shock, having just dropped the phone down on her desk. She asked me to show her the way to the family counselling room where her family had just been told of the death of her beloved uncle. "Family Counseling Room" is a memorial to the pain and healing that took place in that room that day.
"Backhoe" describes my experience at the grave side ceremony of a young friend consigned to the unknown at the age of twenty-three. A backhoe sitting ten feet from the grave made its presence known with its creaking hydraulics. Its operator sat on a tombstone next to it, impatient for us to finish our business so he could go home for the day.
Exactly one year after I stood next to that backhoe I returned to Susie's grave where I found the grass nicely grown in and kids playing softball near by. In "Cemetery" I wrote Susie a last letter.
"Bench" describes an encounter with a memorial bench in a botanical garden where I sat musing about the short life for whom this bench had been given.
Working in a hospital, I'm often in close proximity to calamitous events in the lives of people. One day near the holidays with festive holiday decorations in place, I was sitting in the cafeteria when a "Code 99" announcement over the PA reminded me of the fragility and beauty of life. We call a Code 99 when a patient has gone into cardiac arrest.
One day while driving to the mountains for a Sunday hike I killed a cat on the highway. This is something I have always dreaded doing, especially since I considered cats highly virtuous creatures of civility. In "Lament" I pondered the unknown fates that brought us to the same place in space and time. I wondered if some child cried that night, unable to find a prized pet.
Sometimes the pain is so vast it just obliterates everything in our world and we have a sense of simply melting down. So it was with "Angst."
"Orchid" is the memorial to the linkage Susie and I formed just before she died. My last time with Susie was on a blustery January day in the Orchid house at the botanical gardens. Perhaps her last memories on earth were of orchids. I recall the enchantment she experienced there. "Orchid" proved to be the seed for the first collection of poems that Susie gave me.
Sometimes the best way to deal with really hard circumstances is to laugh hard. Mom requested cremation and we stopped by the funeral home to collect a small copper box containing her ashes which had been placed in a blue velvet bag. "Dear Mom" is the last letter I ever wrote Mom.
A good friend of mine recently returned from his high school reunion where he had found a conspicuous absence of class mates from his class. An alumni magazine listed those that had departed for Eternity. "Alumni News" describes his thoughts on his reunion experience.
"Night Crossing" and "Jet II" were written as memorials to my mother when she died. At the funeral I stood on the chancel steps in the great cathedral and read "Night Crossing" to those assembled. A very dear friend had a fine rose tree sent to me the day after Mom died. The delivery girl told me to be sure to give the tree ash as this "Thorn Tree" would bloom much better.
Hairpin Turns
Five times in about as many months I have casually punched the "play" button on my answering machine to find my life suddenly put on hold. Five times that blinking red harbinger of mortality has announced the death of a family member. Just today, I again punched the button on the answering machine in my office. I soon learned my favorite uncle had just departed for that far away place where even calling cards don't ever work. I also discovered the funeral was in two and a half hours and two hundred and fifty five miles away. It was obvious that getting there in time was an impossibility.
I left work immediately in a leaden, miserable rain, not even stopping by the house to get clothes or toothbrush. Fortunately, I had obtained gas last week and did not need to give precious minutes to getting more. Even thought knowing I didn't have a chance of making it, I probably set a ground speed record for getting between Anderson SC and Chattanooga, TN trying. Have you ever seen a ten-year old Toyota do warp nine? Half way there the windshield wiper motor failed, completely blinding me. Seconds later the rain stopped and never recurred, allowing me to drive the remaining one hundred twenty miles in some degree of safety. As I pulled into the funeral home, a small orange light came on, indicating I was now running on fumes and would soon be walking if I did not do something very soon.
I find myself reflecting on the day as it has unfolded thus far. I started out on my path today headed a specific direction, wanting to get to a single destination, to achieve a particular result. It had been my plan to invest my day in doing an analysis of cardiac patients at the hospital where I work and then going on to the community theater for the evening where I am a volunteer grunt, doing everything from building sets to carrying out the trash. We have an opening night in a week's time and I have a lot to do. Instead, I suddenly find myself rather quickly facing a very different direction, facing death. I didn't plan to square up with death when I got up today, but here I am with my uncle's widow on Ashmore Terrace going for dinner at the cafeteria to have one of those meals that usually happens only when someone dies. I don't think any of us ever plans to embrace death when we arise in the morning. It usually catches us by surprise. Death is often described as being like a thief in the night; very swift, giving no warning.
It occurs to me that life is much like a treacherous mountain road filled with hairpin turns; one filled with anxious moments and surprises. To safely negotiate hairpin turns and continue progressing safely towards our final destination requires that we slow down, often change directions, and be willing to give up our own dream of a level straight-away. If we are unwilling to shift directions and insist on pressing forward on the shortest path, gravity will cast us down into an abyss. If we press forward on our career goals, financial goals, and performance-oriented task lists, we are likely to miss out on much of what is important in life and be cast into a void of missed opportunities for personal growth and relational fulfillment.
It has been my experience to many times drive on some of the most treacherous mountain roads on earth. At the beginning of one such journey we could see our final destination a mere six miles away, across the valley. What we could not see were the hairpin turns embedded in the walls of those volcanic canyons. As we entered the dark shadows, the only thing we could see were the hairpin turns. We never saw Shangri-La again during the entire day. It took fourteen hours to traverse that volcanic vastness on a single unpaved track carved out of the upper reaches of serpentine cliffs. We had to trust the builders of that road knew their way and had completed the passage before us. In the very midst of some profoundly stressful circumstances negotiating that wild place, we were captivated by scenes of unimagined beauty; primeval volcanic valleys cloaked in verdant rain forests illuminated by blazing tropic rainbows. I never would have seen these if I had clung to my own demands for safety, predictability, control, if I had stayed down in the safety of the four-lane. And yes, we did reach our Shangri-La in the darkness of night.
Today I have not negotiated volcanic valleys but I have skirted around the edges of a valley I know I will one day enter fully for myself; the Valley of the Shadow of Death. My uncle went in there for himself on Monday. The rest of us assembled here today are wondering what it is like in there, what is at the far end, and just how bumpy the road is. Not easy things for us to think about, especially being products of a culture that doesn't talk about death and limits grieving to three days of funeral leave.
I had spectacular surprises on that volcanic journey and even as we gathered to "celebrate" death, I made equally splendid discoveries. I discovered four fine cousins I had never known previously and was soon 'mining' their rich histories and swapping e-mail addresses. I found my desperate need for family connection being fulfilled. For several hours we celebrated our shared history and alliance. For the first time in many years, I felt like I had a place, an assemblage of which I was part. It occurred to me how easily I could have missed this if I had not been willing to jettison my plans for the day as originally formulated. When I got that fateful message today I did not think about whether I should come here and spend time with my aunt who has lost her life partner of sixty-two years. I didn't weigh this against the importance of the things on my calendar for today or tomorrow. I simply did it.
I may have a choice about driving on a treacherous mountain road or dropping my plans for the day and going to a funeral. I may cancel my plans for the next hundred days and go on a dream cruise. Yet, there will come a time when I am called to take a voyage and will not be given any options about the arrangements. I will have to face the Valley for myself, as did my uncle. There will be dark shadowy hairpin turns, steep drop-offs, ruts, a lack of guard rails. Most likely, I will be required to make the journey alone. Most often the destination will be out of sight. The journey may be so tortured as to drive from my memory any remembrance of Shangri-La at the far end. As much as I may wish to turn back, it will be impossible. On this single-track road there are no turn-outs or rest areas, no places to turn around.
As ominous as this may sound we can take heart from the most majestic travel brochure ever written: the New Testament. It speaks ever so clearly about the Golden City at the other end of the Valley, with its streets of gold and gates of pearl, a place with no night and no pain. There I will experience an eternity of surprises and discoveries. There we will share one of those feasts that is possible only when we have truly come home. The harsh journey will be instantly forgotten, much as a new mother's pain is submerged in joy. The brochure does warn that the way is narrow but that if we hold onto the Guide's hand we will get there safely. It will be a hard trip for each of us but the destination is tops. I would encourage you to make arrangements in advance with the Guide. Last-minute walk-ups do have a harder time with the journey.
I go to prepare a place for you. If it were not so, I would have told you.
Wake
Suddenly, still silence abounds,
there is time for contemplation.
Screaming voices of achievement yield to
small whispers of quiet reflection.
You regret circadian busyness,
crowding out what could have been.
Tentative in spirit, unsure of your words,
you offer hopeful musings to mourners.
You lay ambrosial flowers on my shrine,
encasing me in retrospective affection.
Passing on, I left you in the fast track.
Aromatic gardens beckon a lane change.
In this redolent parlor of reflection,
a Pathway leads to abundant life.
Let me show you the Way.
Family Counselling Room
Like most hospitals, the one I work in has at least one of these windowless interior voids stashed in an obscure place. For years one can pass by it and not know it's there. Ours is in a rabbit warren of tiny rooms and blind halls behind the Emergency Room. You don't ever want to be told to come to the Family Counselling Room. They don't give out good news in there. Family and friends of victims of auto accidents, gunshots, and heart attacks often have their worst fears realized in the dark recesses of this secret maze.
It was just minutes before quitting time yesterday when I went to tell a co-worker about some newly discovered good fortune of mine. As I entered her office, the phone rang. She was being summoned to this room, as I stood there. She had no idea about this room or where it was. Solemnly, I offered to show her where it is. The nature of it would soon enough be self-evident.
In grim silence we made our way to that far place. We found most of the passageway doors locked but the last one we tried was open. Inside, the labyrinth reverberated with wailing. With uncertainty, Karen knocked on that fateful one labeled 'Family Counselling Room.' Opening the door we experienced a great crescendo of angst and travail. Karen passed into that inner space to encounter that which we spend lifetimes denying.
My navigational services fulfilled, I backed out; retreating to the silent familiar safety of my living world. How could it be that family members are summoned to that unknown place beyond life with no notice or warning? It seemed so brutal. Especially, right at quitting time when the day is supposed to get better, not worse.
In those few seconds when I was suspended in that space between the repugnance of brutal sudden death and the allure of life, I saw something magic. The doorway into that Family Counselling Room revealed people tenaciously living life, ferociously loving each other, and proclaiming someone mattered a whole lot to them. If only I could be so lucky as to have lived a life such that a Family Counselling Room full of people would feel my departure to be a real loss. This fellow was fortunate. He lived right and the room was full.
Backhoe
A dear friend has just flown beyond,
to that place from which postcards never come.
Raw earth, newly dug, squints in the brightness of day,
still used to its subterranean darkness.
You rest, your hydraulics still creaking,
your yellow earth-stained maw downcast.
We survivors take refuge in life,
our young traveller in her mahogany shrine.
The preachers tell us of hope and safety,
the raw still-steaming earth, of brutality.
Family and friends disperse to life,
seeking to believe the message heard.
You consign our young flower to the blackness,
your maw re-filling the earthen void.
The Son has risen, to meet our traveller.
Code 99
Attaching great value to the trivial;
commerce of living consumed me.
Giving little thought to the sacred,
I squandered priceless days of life.
A mere heart beat from the unknown,
I indulged in animated sentience.
Frolicking in spectral delights of Christmas,
I hear announcement of your passing.
Your heart ceasing to pulsate,
I give pause to take thought.
You have taught me about true living.
Cemetery
We came by to see you today but you weren't in. It seems like ages since we last saw you, perhaps a year or more. We haven't heard anything of you and were thinking of you. Thought you might want to know what's been up this past year.
We had a much colder winter than usual, it actually snowed five times. Yeah, here in the south no less! Spring seemed late this year and probably still hasn't showed up in the north. The TV said it snowed in Wisconsin last night. Today is almost like that day last year when we were last together; bright and sunny with the flowers finally claiming victory over winter. There are lots of the yellow ones you like so much. In fact, there is a bunch of yellow roses right here. Not sure who brought them. Maybe your Mom. She seemed to know about them.
We climbed to a really cool glacier field in the Canadian Rockies last August on a horse. Pretty scaring going up a cliff on a feisty beast that seemed more interested in eating than staying alive. But you know about scary stuff, don't you? We got down alive and I wrote a poem about it called "Struggle." A poem? Yeah. I kept wondering if I should get down off that horse and go on my own. It seemed the safer thing to do. I stayed on the horse because I didn't want to let on I was chicken.
I remember how much you liked being outside in green wild places. Your Mom gave me that picture of you on the rocks in the Chatooga River. I keep it here on my desk at work, also with that last letter you wrote me at Valentine's. A bunch of us got to go to the Amazon in October which seemed really wild and really big. We wanted to learn about the medicinal value of the plants growing there. I have given an Amazon program in a bunch of the schools. The kids thought the big snakes the best. I got a picture of a 200 pound Anaconda snake up in the trees. You should have seen the kids go wild. I think you would like to go there sometime. I wonder if they have stuff like the Amazon where you are.
You would like the name thing they put here for you. It has three butterflies carved into the stone. Below the dates it says you were a REAL person. That's for sure. Someone has kept the grass cut and your place looks nice here. The grass is starting to grow in pretty well now from the edges. You would be pleased to know a bunch of kids are nearby playing the first early spring softball game and laughing a lot.
It's really weird, but since you left I keep getting all these poems. I never cared about reading them and certainly had no interest in writing one. I was standing right here a year ago, just after you left, and had the first one come into my head. Since then I have gotten hundreds of them. I made a book of them at Christmas called Orchids. I told the readers about you at the beginning. It seemed that since I got the first one here I should tell people about you. Would you believe I sold them all and don't have any more copies? They seem to really like hearing about you. There is going to be a second book of poems this summer. I wish I could send you copies of these but I don't have an address for you. I think you would like them.
The timing was unreal. I came three hundred miles to see you today and found out on this very day the botanical garden was having its big annual plant sale. Way cool!! I went and got an orchid plant for your Mom and took it to her. She was afraid she would kill it but was glad I had brought it to her. Jan gave me a big book on growing orchids and I told your Mom I would call her and tell her what the book said about keeping them alive. I wanted to get a yellow Orchid but they were too expensive. I got her one with five pure white flowers on it.
Your Mom seems to be doing pretty good. She has had a hard time in the past hasn't she? She has those days where she cries a lot and other days she is able to go do stuff in the garden and laugh a bit. Your step dad seems OK. He was nice to me when I came by to bring your mom the plant. Your brother moved out last week. He is having a hard time with stuff. I think he must miss you a lot and is not sure what to think about your leaving so soon.
Your Mom has kept your room just the way you had it. Your stuff is still all there and no one has messed with it. I remember when I came home from college and they had made my room into a workshop. It felt real bad. Your room looks like you still live in it. That quilt thing your friend made for you is still in the same place on the wall by your bed where you had me hang it up. I haven't seen Heather so can't say how she is for sure. I remember something from your mom a couple months back saying she was doing fine then.
Gotta go now. It's getting dark out here. We miss ya. Hope that things are going OK for you there where you are. Do you guys get e-mail there? I went on-line last month.
CJ
Bench
Riding the electric trolley Sunday afternoon,
I shared joy with others living their dreams.
My day colorized with resplendent blooms,
hopeful expectations paint my aureate future.
This tranquil space, set aside for peace,
enfolds me in shimmering arboreal fantasy.
Walking in sacred cathedrals of spruce,
I came upon a memorial to your life.
Finely crafted wood, embellished with brass,
tells me your short life was of great value.
I wonder what gracious soul loved you;
wanting me to know of your brief sojourn.
What were your favorite comic strips?
Were you a Trekkie? Ever play baseball?
Did you ever fall in enraptured love?
Did you have communion at sunset with another?
Did you find your Way to that far Place,
where night never comes and pain is no more?
Mind if I sit down?
Lament
Solar radiance illuminated your day,
promising hours of frolicking feline fun.
The rising astral pendant gilded my day,
offering omens of actualization and catharsis.
Unknown to us both, our paths converged,
shared ignorance keeping us in summer bliss.
Serpentine ribbons of asphalt beckoning,
I set off for ascendant possibilities.
Greener grass on the other side seducing,
you sprinted across into your destiny.
In the fusion of our fates you faltered,
never seeing the apparition that befell you.
Melancholy shadows darkening my soul,
a young child cries, wondering why.
I couldn't stop in time.
Angst
Far away, tendrils of your heartache
extend darkness in the lingering night.
Cold mist shrouds my soul;
early morning warmth eluding me.
Shared pain galvanizing great grief,
I send prayers of petition Beyond Orion.
Your tears staining our hearts,
I look behind stars for your Comfort.
He answers.
Orchid
You come to me in your hour of great anguish;
the sands are nearly gone from your glass.
Your blossom too, is fading, your spirit heavy,
your pain reminding you of the shortness of time.
I too know loss, my blooms quickly fail;
much of life for me is without color.
I most often being little more than weed,
rarely enchant you with my splendor.
You, a young flower in His image, fearful of fading,
come share in the fragrance of my bloom,
delight in the vibrancy of my spectral outburst.
For a moment, we will share our blooms together,
remember me in your darkness,
it is in darkness we best rest.
We will both bloom again,
I for but a short season,
For you, your sands will never again fail.
The Gardener tends us both.
Calendar
February, the month of love; short and sweet. Valentine's Day. From what I figure, you spent sixty two of them with your childhood sweetheart, snitching Valentine's kisses twenty years before I came to Earth.
I'm sitting here in your kitchen chair, wondering what your second full day there is like; curious to know if you have gotten settled in yet. From the small bits I hear, it's supposed to be pretty easy to get used to the place and anything you could ever need or want is provided by the management. Is this true? The only negative thing I have ever heard is that the road getting up there is often pretty rough, with some really painful bumps and ruts. I trust you were able to avoid the worst parts of it.
From where I am sitting I can see your monthly wall calendar hanging next to the phone. The picture shows a really fine winter scene of snow muffins on a creek flowing past a stately stone grist mill some place in Massachusetts. Life flows on doesn't it?. Birthdays. Annual termite spraying. Lion's Club meetings. Circle dinners. Death. Death? Death?? What's that got to do with life? Why's that word here on your calendar page? The space for Monday the twenty-fourth is filled in with a small uncertain blue script "M. - died." Is that about you?
"Wonderful Life" is written in the square for Thursday the sixth. What's this about? For certain, you had eight-three wonderful years and sixty-two fabulous ones. Your soul mate is in her chair across from me, nodding animated agreement.
Thursday the thirteenth. The square is marked "Lions." Did you really get to Lion's Club just two days before you started that last road trip? You always were a real trooper for the community. I hope you had a good understudy to take over your role. According to this, I notice that you're supposed to attend the Lions meeting tomorrow. I guess someone has told them that you are out of town on an extended trip.
There's a serpentine line starting on the space for Monday the seventeenth, President's Day and ending at Monday the twenty-fourth. "Hospital" is written in the middle of it in that same uncertain blue. I sure hope that wavering line didn't have a lot of pot holes in it. Somehow it seems appropriate for you to start out on President's Day as you were headed for what might be thought of as the ultimate White House.
Is death a bit like child birth? Is the pain forgotten the second the job is finished? I hear that mothers forget their pain in the instant that brand new life proclaims its arrival. Was it this way for you? Was that awful road trip forgotten the minute you saw those majestic gates? Is your pain all gone? Did the One who vanquished death, transforming it into a miraculous gateway to eternity, meet you there?
Remember to write.
Alumni News
I saw your name there.
It was on the list.
I'm certain it was you.
We never knew about the list.
Back then we dreamed.
We were immortal.
No one ever told us.
We believed the lie.
Life lasts forever.
You found out, didn't you?
Winter comes after Indian summer.
Is it cold over there?
We won the conference this year.
19 August, 1996
Dear Mom:
We went by to pick you up for church today and a professional rather proper lady brought you out to meet us. Curiously, we had to sign some papers before they would let you leave with us. I am not sure what I expected but I didn't expect you to be quite as we found you. We weren't really sure how you would want us to act; seeing you in that blue velvet get-up, so we hid behind a bit of comedy. It was hard to keep a straight face when Mark said that you would have to wait out in the car while we went into church. I hope you didn't mind. Don't worry, I managed to avoid cracking an inappropriate smile during the homily when I thought of the dry humor of Mark's one-liner. We actually thought you would have been amused at his fast wit. He may have pushed the envelope a bit with another one of his one-liners, but cut him some slack, he's had a rather bad day, as you might imagine. We had been driving for a while on our way to the church when he said "I don't think I've heard Mom be quiet this long before." It was impossible to not break out into laughter. You may recall you were sitting in the back seat next to me and it had been really quiet in the car.
It's about midnight on Monday. Its strange to think that this is your last night with us, here inside. Mark is scheduled to take you out to Catalina tomorrow for your last trip across the channel. I remember how much you enjoyed that crossing. Today in church I read a story about how much you liked to navigate at the radar and work the radio at night. From what I can tell, those present in the service today really valued hearing this about you.
I am finding some solace in the deep quiet here in the middle of the night. I wandered around in those magnificent, beautiful gardens behind Mark's house for a long time tonight and watched the moon set. You would have rather liked it out there. I went around and touched many of the flowers there, blessing their health. It was a good place to be, yet a sad place tonight. I went to bed without seeing anyone else.
You and I lived so far apart, in so many ways, for so many years. I have a sense of reverence and privilege that for your last night here, we are no longer so far apart and will sleep in the same room. I find on this, your final night here, that I remember the last time I saw you, before you had on that blue velvet we found you in today. You were in that pure white fox coat at the Clemson train station with that mountain of luggage you always carried with you. I never was sure what was in all that stuff. I am glad I have that image of our last time together. I remember you had your hair done up nice. I have happy memories of giving Jan sendoffs from that same small train station in Clemson. Knowing how much you like trains, you would be happy to know that I am helping a kid down the street put together a monster railroad layout. His father let him take over the living room to do this. His mother left three years ago to go the same place you're now headed to.
This seems like it's turning into some ramblings. Just wanted you to have one last note before you left tomorrow. Hope you get a good sleep tonight. I wish you peace and blessing on your trip tomorrow. Oh, by the way, I snitched three red rose buds from one of your flower arrangements at the church when no one was looking. They freshened up nicely when I put them in a decanter I found in our room.
Love,
Craig
Night Crossing
One of the things Mom loved most was yachting. She much preferred the less pretentious term, ‘boating.’ We had many happy memories of dropping anchor at Emerald Bay and Avalon Harbor at Catalina Island off the California coast. A favorite haunt was the Isthmus on the far side of the island. I recall moonlit sorties by dinghy, rafting up with other boats, playing on the sandy beaches. Certainly, some of the grander memories of my growing up were those experiences in those deep blue coastal waters.
One of the high points of Mom’s often difficult life was night cruising in our offshore cruiser to Catalina; her face illuminated by the emerald glow of the radar screen. She enjoyed being navigator and guiding us in the darkness across inky waters. At the mid point of the crossing one is unable to see land in either direction and becomes quite dependent on the compass and radar to provide safe passage at night. In the dense coastal fog that forms after midnight, all that we were able to see by light of day lost its value in the ebony shadows. We had to put our confidence in the instruments.
Mom won’t be making that night cruise any more. Some time ago the boat burned to the water line after an electrical problem and was a total loss. This morning Mom died alone in a hospital room, but she will see those cerulean coastal waters once more as she travels to a far place. At her request, her ashes will be scattered at sea on an August summer day.
The Christian scriptures say that for now we see in a mirror dimly but will one day see with great clarity. A reality for all of us is that we are called to make a final journey on which we are unable to see land either way and are required to trust the instruments. In the turbulent seas of terminal illness and death we have nothing but the compass of Faith and the sextant of Hope, but, they are more than enough. We made that night crossing many times in choppy seas with nothing to go on but a small green blip on a radar screen and a white needle in front of a small luminous ring of numbers. Yet, every time we arrived safely, even when the journey was stormy.
In My Father’s house are many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have told you. I go now to prepare a place for you.
Jet II
My mother experienced the pioneering era of American aviation and was herself a pilot, dancing in the clouds in canvas-covered biplanes. She even shared a hanger with Amelia Earhart. Over the years she saw the advent of commercial air travel, the coming of age of the jet, and even the accession of space flight. Today, soaring above rainbows is profoundly ordinary for millions. Ferocious fare wars are frequently fought in the skies of America. I myself have flown many hundreds of times to the farthest reaches of the globe; often seeing rainbows from the top side.
It seems to be a reality in the human experience that we come into the world free of fears but become all too proficient at collecting them along the way. Mom lost her ascendant visions of alto-cumulus towers and long ago became fearful of flying. No particular reason really, perhaps reading too carefully, too often, about those rare planes that crashed but forgetting about the vast number that never did. In her last years Mom refused to consider air travel and instead opted for Amtrak. On her rare travels from the west coast, Mom would make a trip to the east coast, visiting family along the way. Her last time on Amtrak, fear got the best of Mom and she was put on a plane at New Orleans and returned home. She never ventured out again except to a hospital and doctor’s office building a mile from where she spent her last years.
Mom died today, in that hospital down the street. Much of my childhood was spent in that same hospital visiting her where she was its best customer. Mom has now pushed beyond her greatest fears, leaving pain behind. She’s no longer afraid and has now embarked on taking the ultimate flight, to that place beyond the reach of jet turbine and airfoil. The Christian scriptures say that we “can do all things through Him who strengthens us.” Mom has taken great strides and moved on, leaving us with the grand possibility of flying above our own fears, to reaching a place where we live in confidence assurance of Him who has gone before us. She’s on the other side now and sees that the only thing to really fear is fear itself; the great thief.
God has not give us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind.
Changes
Change, the inevitable seasoning of life,
Today I learn my job may be eliminated.
The cerulean benevolence above
gives way to a leaden tempest.
The state names, the city names;
they are becoming foreign.
My young flower wilts in the torrid heat
of neoplastic frenzy.
There is no one to water her garden.
The botanical delights will in days be
but as solid waste for compost.
The polished mahogany shrine will tomorrow
be consigned to the subterranean darkness.
Another is to join my flower at sunset,
catapulted beyond, leaving the concrete ribbon,
commemorated by the flashing of red, white, and blue,
A procession of thousands passes by,
hurrying to their suburban fortresses,
I join the procession with them.
The fortress is secure,
those within have clung to their frantic living,
someone is calling on the second line of the other phone.
There are thirty-one messages on the machine.
A young man slips through the cracks,
no one is with him in a dark place,
as he wonders where my flower went.
There is a sterling moon,
pendant above the leaden tempest.
The dogwoods are in bloom,
tomorrow a solar celebration will greet them.
Easter is near.
Thorn Tree
It's a cerulean day, unusually cool and splendid for early August here in the deep south. Fresh rains have renewed the grass and gardens, washing away the brittle brown dryness of an arid July, leaving an emerald realm. Even the cat that lets me live with her is spunky after an extended lethargy that cats always have during southern summers. Today my mother is scheduled for cremation, her ashes to be scattered over the blue waters of the Pacific. Of course, it's not something I would wish on anyone, yet there does seem to be an order to the day. Often, we get cards at such times that quote from Ecclesiastes assuring us there is a divine order to the great events of life, especially the real hard ones like death. Like having Mother die alone in a hospital room and being three thousand miles away. You know, I almost believe it.
Today I got a rather fine illustration of an important foundational concept of life; that in dying, there is newness of life. We all know that corn must dry out and die down to seed to give rise to next year's corn and that this is true for all living plants. We would never appreciate the beauty of azaleas if they stayed in bloom all year. We would never cherish spring if it were not preceded by harsh winter. One of the great struggles of the human experience is learning to appreciate things before we lose them. This is often tragically true in the death of family members. Even so, in the ashen sorrow of death opportunity presents itself for renewal. In the two short days since Mother's passing, there has been renewal between those estranged for years, appreciating those things once depreciated. In our living we experienced much challenge and difficulty. In mom's death and dying and the settling of her affairs there has been grand calmness, order, and civility. We are discovering diamonds in our own midst.
Two days after Mother died I was at home when the doorbell was rung, heralding a delivery. Normally, I'm not home during the day but my employer graciously suggested I take off several days to work through this time of transition and loss. On the porch was a large empty‑handed woman saying she had a delivery for me and asking if I wanted it outside or in the house. 'It' turned out to be a large Jackson and Perkins rose tree; a variety called 'double delight.' I told her one of my very favorite things to do when I went to Birmingham every month was to visit the rose gardens in the arboretum. Looking at the card I saw that this elegant symbol of life was, in fact, from the very one I so often walk with in those fine rose gardens. I asked the delivery woman what I needed to do in order to assure its survival and blooming. She said "Be sure to put ashes in the soil and water every day."
We can complain that roses have thorns or we can be thankful that thorn bushes have roses.
Some Reflections
Two years ago I was invited to enter the dark shadows with a young traveler, one about to enter the unknown terrain of terminal cancer at age 23. It had been my plan to take Susie to Europe to fulfill her last wish of walking on the ramparts of the Edwardian Castles. Susie was never able to make that journey with me, as her health rapidly failed. She was, too soon, called to make another much longer journey. As torturous as the journey was for her, it has taken her to the ultimate destination, a magnificent city with streets of gold and gates of pearl where there is no pain and no night.
My experiences with Susie as she completed her earthly journey were life changing. Susie gave me a priceless gift that lives on. She enabled me to see much more clearly the extraordinary value of ordinary life and simply sharing it with close friends and family. I think back to my good friend, Nancy, who told me that cancer had shown her how blue the sky really is and how important good friends are.
In the past six months I have seen the flickering shadows dance around me many times. Six months ago, in a balmy southern California August, my mother slipped quietly beyond the darkness after a torturous path that had carried her across several years, to a place free of pain and anguish. Only three months later, just before the nation celebrated Thanksgiving, her only sibling, Elizabeth, my favorite aunt in childhood, followed her to the same destination. A mere two weeks later a nephew at the tender young age of twenty one was driving at night and hit a patch of black ice. He was instantly catapulted into eternity, leaving his family alone for the Thanksgiving holiday. The following month, a week before Christmas, my faithful Aunt Nancy went forward on her journey to experience the true meaning of Christmas for herself. She went to claim the heavenly inheritance which Christmas and Easter made possible for her. It goes on.
Just this past week I returned from the final departure of my favorite uncle, Marion. My father died when I was less than a year old and if I had been given a choice for someone to replace the father I had lost, it would have been this dear uncle. I like to think that my dad and Uncle Marion are catching up on a lot of years.
People wonder how it is that I stay sane and don't 'lose it' with all of this death around me. I have even had some people quip that perhaps it is not such a good idea to be my friend, it might be hazardous to their health. You see, I have not even mentioned the eternal departures of friends and acquaintances that have occurred in the same time period. I think sanity and serenity, in the face of something as challenging as death, comes from seeing beyond it to the far side. It may also come from having once faced the prospect myself of making the final journey very early in life. Somehow, even the hardest things are the slightest bit easier once they become familiar.
There is no question that the trip to Eternity can be a lonely tortured one with much pain, many ruts, pot holes, liquid anxiety, and fear. We are truly fortunate to live in an era when many clinical studies and the collected experiences of millions of people suggest that there really is a fabulous destination at the far end of the journey. These experiences most often have left the travellers completely transfixed and changed for the better. Written accounts of their eternal journeys fill the best seller lists, and rightfully so. The Hope contained in them is truly inspiring. Near-death experiences and other spiritual experiences give much credence to the Hope of the ancient Christian message. One in which the darkness of Good Friday gives way to the newness of life that comes with Easter.
You may be having a really hard time today. You may be travelling into the Valley of the shadow yourself and experiencing vast fear. You may be watching your dearest soulmate of fifty years slipping into the darkness and have no light to offer.
On the first Good Friday it was not yet known that the
Giver of Life was going to be raised up in three days after having, Himself, passed through the darkest depths of death. It is certain that first Friday was called anything but good. There was a level of despair among those close to Jesus that would be hard to describe. What made that Friday good was that the most remarkable event in all of history happened on the following Sunday. Each year much of the world celebrates this glorious event. Each year we emerge from the darkness of winter at Easter to celebrate the radiance of spring.
If you have just lost someone that has walked with you through life for many years, or you have just sat in front of a physician's desk and been given a diagnostic death sentence, then you are probably experiencing a dark Friday of despair and you are profoundly interested in knowing if there is going to be a miracle for you on Sunday. The good news for you is the miracle that happened that first Sunday centuries ago is one that you can appropriate for yourself.
You may not have the safety of many years of good health after a traumatic diagnosis or the healing of time after the heart-rending loss of a soul mate. You may be reading this from a hospital bed and wondering whether you will walk out the front door or get discretely rolled out the back door. You may be sleeping in a bed alone for the first time in fifty years and the flowers are still fresh on the newly turned earth. The loneliness may seem as vast as all of the universe and as black as cosmic night. It doesn't get any harder than that.
It seems to be true of human experience, that by having others simply understand our adversity, the shadows lose a bit of their darkness and the winds howl a bit less loudly. No matter how long you will be required to continue on your difficult journey you can reach out and find a Hand there to help you along. The One who blasted back into history on Easter is waiting to life you up in spirit and assure you the journey will be worth it all.
It seems there is a different set of rules among those who have faced and are facing severe loss of health and well being or a soulmate. There is a graciousness, openness, and transparency that is often missing out here among the healthy and those who don't have to sleep alone. There is no fast-lane there and the road is peopled with some of the most gentle and compassionate travellers you could ever want to meet. On the following pages are memorials to many of these people and their gracious gifts to the rest of us. May their gifts make your journey easier.
My experiences with Susie as she completed her earthly journey were life changing. Susie gave me a priceless gift that lives on. She enabled me to see much more clearly the extraordinary value of ordinary life and simply sharing it with close friends and family. I think back to my good friend, Nancy, who told me that cancer had shown her how blue the sky really is and how important good friends are.
In the past six months I have seen the flickering shadows dance around me many times. Six months ago, in a balmy southern California August, my mother slipped quietly beyond the darkness after a torturous path that had carried her across several years, to a place free of pain and anguish. Only three months later, just before the nation celebrated Thanksgiving, her only sibling, Elizabeth, my favorite aunt in childhood, followed her to the same destination. A mere two weeks later a nephew at the tender young age of twenty one was driving at night and hit a patch of black ice. He was instantly catapulted into eternity, leaving his family alone for the Thanksgiving holiday. The following month, a week before Christmas, my faithful Aunt Nancy went forward on her journey to experience the true meaning of Christmas for herself. She went to claim the heavenly inheritance which Christmas and Easter made possible for her. It goes on.
Just this past week I returned from the final departure of my favorite uncle, Marion. My father died when I was less than a year old and if I had been given a choice for someone to replace the father I had lost, it would have been this dear uncle. I like to think that my dad and Uncle Marion are catching up on a lot of years.
People wonder how it is that I stay sane and don't 'lose it' with all of this death around me. I have even had some people quip that perhaps it is not such a good idea to be my friend, it might be hazardous to their health. You see, I have not even mentioned the eternal departures of friends and acquaintances that have occurred in the same time period. I think sanity and serenity, in the face of something as challenging as death, comes from seeing beyond it to the far side. It may also come from having once faced the prospect myself of making the final journey very early in life. Somehow, even the hardest things are the slightest bit easier once they become familiar.
There is no question that the trip to Eternity can be a lonely tortured one with much pain, many ruts, pot holes, liquid anxiety, and fear. We are truly fortunate to live in an era when many clinical studies and the collected experiences of millions of people suggest that there really is a fabulous destination at the far end of the journey. These experiences most often have left the travellers completely transfixed and changed for the better. Written accounts of their eternal journeys fill the best seller lists, and rightfully so. The Hope contained in them is truly inspiring. Near-death experiences and other spiritual experiences give much credence to the Hope of the ancient Christian message. One in which the darkness of Good Friday gives way to the newness of life that comes with Easter.
You may be having a really hard time today. You may be travelling into the Valley of the shadow yourself and experiencing vast fear. You may be watching your dearest soulmate of fifty years slipping into the darkness and have no light to offer.
On the first Good Friday it was not yet known that the
Giver of Life was going to be raised up in three days after having, Himself, passed through the darkest depths of death. It is certain that first Friday was called anything but good. There was a level of despair among those close to Jesus that would be hard to describe. What made that Friday good was that the most remarkable event in all of history happened on the following Sunday. Each year much of the world celebrates this glorious event. Each year we emerge from the darkness of winter at Easter to celebrate the radiance of spring.
If you have just lost someone that has walked with you through life for many years, or you have just sat in front of a physician's desk and been given a diagnostic death sentence, then you are probably experiencing a dark Friday of despair and you are profoundly interested in knowing if there is going to be a miracle for you on Sunday. The good news for you is the miracle that happened that first Sunday centuries ago is one that you can appropriate for yourself.
You may not have the safety of many years of good health after a traumatic diagnosis or the healing of time after the heart-rending loss of a soul mate. You may be reading this from a hospital bed and wondering whether you will walk out the front door or get discretely rolled out the back door. You may be sleeping in a bed alone for the first time in fifty years and the flowers are still fresh on the newly turned earth. The loneliness may seem as vast as all of the universe and as black as cosmic night. It doesn't get any harder than that.
It seems to be true of human experience, that by having others simply understand our adversity, the shadows lose a bit of their darkness and the winds howl a bit less loudly. No matter how long you will be required to continue on your difficult journey you can reach out and find a Hand there to help you along. The One who blasted back into history on Easter is waiting to life you up in spirit and assure you the journey will be worth it all.
It seems there is a different set of rules among those who have faced and are facing severe loss of health and well being or a soulmate. There is a graciousness, openness, and transparency that is often missing out here among the healthy and those who don't have to sleep alone. There is no fast-lane there and the road is peopled with some of the most gentle and compassionate travellers you could ever want to meet. On the following pages are memorials to many of these people and their gracious gifts to the rest of us. May their gifts make your journey easier.
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