I came across this really good piece today. It got me thinking, not that I don't do that all the time.
Being forced to go closer to death
than I ever wanted to for the third time, fourth time, fifth time.
My first born son in 1977 at age three, an older sister died by suicide in 1978 at age 29,
second son in 1979 at age 8 months, oldest daughter in 2008 at age 23. My dad at age 70.
Too much death, but we will all die. The death rate remains the same, no matter at what age, but
we were not meant to die. Death came as the result of sin. God has a plan whereby we can be assured that we will live with him, to "dwell in the house of the Lord forever".
That time I thought I could not go any closer to grief without dying
I went closer, and I did not die. Surely God had His hand in this,
as well as friends. Still, I was bent, and my laughter,
as the poet said, was nowhere to be found.
Then said my friend Daniel(brave even among lions),
"It's not the weight you carry but how you carry it -
books, bricks, grief - it's all in the way you embrace it,
balance it, carry it when you cannot, and would not,
put it down."
So I went practicing. Have you noticed? Have you heard
the laughter that comes, now and again, out of my
startled mouth? How I linger to admire, admire,
admire the things of this world that are kind, and maybe
also troubled - roses in the wind,the sea geese on the
steep waves, a love to which there is no reply?
- by Mary Oliver
