facing grief
May 25, 2022
Along the Tiber in early Spring - Roma, Italia.
As usual, Tuesday morning found me thinking through ideas of what to share here this week - I have plenty of new images, as well a few fun things in the works for the summer - all of which I've been looking forward to talking about.
However, Tuesday afternoon changed everything. As I saw the news of another tragic and infuriating act of gun violence in Uvalde, Texas - all those ideas went out the window.
I've lived a certain share of grief in my own life, about which I could write at length, but I cannot fathom the grief felt by the families of the children and teachers killed in Uvalde yesterday (nor can I begin to imagine the grief felt by the families of those killed in Buffalo, NY almost two weeks ago - and these are only two of over two hundred mass shootings in the US so far this year).
Something has to change - and I do believe that we need to be the catalysts of that change - we cannot sit on the sidelines of political process and expect things to happen without getting involved.
But today, for everyone grieving, because of these acts of violence, or because of anything else in our lives that has plunged us into grief, or brought us pain, fear, trauma... may we all know we are not alone.
I don't have any more words right now, so I'll end this with words from the author John O'Donohue about grief:
"When you lose someone you love,
Your life becomes strange,
The ground beneath you gets fragile,
Your thoughts make your eyes unsure;
And some dead echo drags your voice down
Where words have no confidence.
Your heart has grown heavy with loss;
And though this loss has wounded others too,
No one knows what has been taken from you
When the silence of absence deepens.
Flickers of guilt kindle regret
For all that was left unsaid or undone.
There are days when you wake up happy;
Again inside the fullness of life,
Until the moment breaks
And you are thrown back
Onto the black tide of loss.
Days when you have your heart back,
You are able to function well
Until in the middle of work or encounter,
Suddenly with no warning,
You are ambushed by grief.
It becomes hard to trust yourself.
All you can depend on now is that
Sorrow will remain faithful to itself.
More than you, it knows its way
And will find the right time
To pull and pull the rope of grief
Until that coiled hill of tears
Has reduced to its last drop.
Gradually, you will learn acquaintance
With the invisible form of your departed;
And when the work of grief is done,
The wound of loss will heal
And you will have learned
To wean your eyes
From that gap in the air
And be able to enter the hearth
In your soul where your loved one
Has awaited your return
All the time."