how cruel, unfair, unkind

that grief is expressed

in direct proportion to love

that has been lost

i don’t know why it is this way

or what any of us could do to make the sting of grief subside

but i do sense that grief is a lantern

being fueled by some unspeakable touch stone

with our humanity.

the lantern burns the brightest

only when we have bravely given every last measure of devotion—even as death and pain were staring us down and we wished to run and hide.

when we stay with the truth of birth and death,

when we caress the face of our beloved and say our goodbyes,

when we grieve the future we thought lay at our feet,

when we cast seeds of grass, flowers and fruit into the unknown next realm

when we stay with death instead of leaping to turn it into heaven,

somehow we are more fully alive, more present, more stitched together by love.

i thought for many years that grief was a burden to those around me,

that i ought to hide from anyone who was having a good day.

but i was wrong about this.

i think the lantern of grief ought to be shared in whatever portion the grieving can muster.

because it is a companion to us all — there to remind us that, if courageous, we too can be changed by a love that leaves us wandering the desert in its absence.

Gibran wished that we would all know the pain of too much tenderness.

And I think grief is saying something similar: we have known the pain of being fully, utterly, unshakably human and tender.

In grief we touch our own birth and our own certain end.

And i am convinced that not much helps us come more fully alive.

So do your bidding, oh great lantern of grief,

be my companion in the darkness of loss,

in the thirst of the desert,

in the pain of too much tenderness.

Shine your light so we may all connect once again with this:

that our human lives are sacred, withering holders of deep mysteries.

And by your light may we see the path home more fully.

Blog