Category: mourning

Delight: Extreme Satisfaction; Joy

Keep company with God,
    get in on the best.
(Psalm 37:4 The Message)
 
Take delight in the Lord,
    and he will give you your heart’s desires.
(Psalm 37:4 NLT)
 
 
 
 
Last month filled my heart with great satisfaction. I kept company with God with my nieces and nephews. We had quiet, creative mornings and fun-filled afternoons. We met with friends and we stayed home.
 
My favorite memory of the month was introducing them to the idea of meeting with Jesus in their heart room. My sister gave us a book of meditations to read over the month. Most mornings after breakfast, we gathered in the quiet corner and contemplated some object that introduced us to an aspect of God’s love and presence in our lives.
 
We imagined a kite flying freely in the sky, and then we thought about how God holds us secure, yet allows us to express ourselves freely. How the presence of the Holy Spirit sustains us and thrills us as we soar in God’s loving care.
 
One day we recalled the birth of Jesus. Then we contemplated the cross and the pain He suffered on our behalf. The next day we celebrated His triumph over death. We remembered His sacrifice with the bread and with the cup.
 
Our days together ended with a loss. During our last week together, our dear dog, age fourteen, became feebler. Each child responded in their own way, when we told them she had died. We cried and talked about her life, and my youngest niece led us in a meaningful memorial time by burying Milli’s collar and play toy in the garden.
 
What delight children and pets bring to our lives. I am grateful for the time we had together, both the highs and lows of the month. As we go into July, I have prayer on my heart.
 
Sometimes I find it difficult to pray. At those times I am drawn to the written prayers of others. Last week, also marked the death of a dear family friend. She lived far from us, and I am thankful for the years we were able to visit with her the past several summers. Over the years my family and I enjoyed Mary’s company and her hospitality, whenever we came in to town for a visit.
 
Here is a prayer for those who love her and miss her:
 
Almighty God, Father of all mercies and giver of all comfort, deal graciously we pray as we mourn, casting all our care on Thee, knowing the consolation of Thy love; through Christ Jesus Our Lord.
 
(Book of Common Prayer 1928, adapted)
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Thrilling Guest Thursday: Lynn Morrissey

 
You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you. (Matthew 5:4 The Message)

 

Death springs forth often unexpectedly, yet through Christ, death has lost it’s sting. Today, I have invited Lynn D. Morrissey to share how she uses writing poetry as a means to honor a loved one who has passed on from this life.  As I comtemplated her poem, I not only thought of grieving over a person, but also sorrowing over any loss, including seasons of life. Lynn opens with an introduction to her writing process and then we have her poem.  (Kel)

Here’s Lynn:

When loved ones die, we long to remember—to remember the sheen of her hair and the shine of her eyes, the sway of his gait and the sound of his voice, the lilt of their laughter and the lyrics of their heart.

We think we’ll never forget, but we do. Cherished memories recede like haunting echoes of a faraway loon, like sepia photographs fading with time …

We need a way to remember—to indelibly stamp our beloved’s heart-print onto our own so that we might never forget. And one sure way is with ink, in words. Writing traces whorls and swirls of our soul into patterns of permanence. Writing remembers. Writing honors. Memories penned say, You lived and loved. You laughed and lamented. You mingled and mattered. Scribed remembrances bottle the fragrance, the feelings, the fellowship of relationships that once were, and now always can remain, stored in the heart.

I penned this poem in memory of a friend’s mother upon the first anniversary of her passing. I offered it to him, with love, as a way to say, I honor her, and in so doing, I honor you. Roses were her favorite flower. Surely, their summer fragrance evokes for my friend his mother’s memory now, even in the winter of his grief. Hopefully, too, my words etch her essence, making her soul visible, and remind him of the presence and purposes of the invisible God in life and in death.

                                                                        
Might you consider composing a “roses of remembrance” poem honoring someone you miss or as a gift for someone who has lost a loved one? One form of poetry which is especially meaningful is an alpha poem (abecedarian), which uses a person’s name in bold lettering as a vertical acrostic around which to wrap the body of the poem. I have done this numerous times, and had the poems framed as a special gift. They are always received with emotion and gratitude. You could do the same and offer special comfort to those who need it.

Roses of Remembrance

 
“God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December.” —Barrie

 

A year has come and gone,

commemorated with parading autumnal suns
(and those of winter, spring, and summer),
marking the march of unstoppable days.

The spray of crimson roses, long-since frayed atop her stone,

has fleetly decayed like a tatterdemalion scattering of tears, petaling her grave—
vanished, unsettingly, sans trace.

Why must roses languish and die?

Why must their grace, their velvetine voluptuousness
corrupt,
giving sway to decline,
as day gives way to night,
laughter to tears,
melismas to silence?
Why must that which can but delight
take flight like a sudden exultation of larks
beating rapturous wings into darkness,
then disappear?

Why can’t roses endure in Edenic purity—

vivid, redolent, regal in unequaled beauty?
Why must evanescence quell such magnificent efflorescence?

Why?

There is no answer but to question, How?

 

How to live in light of all deaths, little and large,

in light of what we cannot fully comprehend,
but have no choice but to accept?
How to face all endings, their unequivocal inevitability?
How to grasp what eludes, preserve what won’t last?
What’s our charge?

To live largely, lavishly,

cultivating God’s flowers
and souls and hours and minutes minutely,
with open eyes and open arms,
relishing each one,
distilling them to their core,
and when they’re no more . . .
gathering roses of remembrance
—fragrant with love, past; perfuming life, present—
emblems of what never dies: the rose’s essence.

God prunes the bush with death’s sharp shears,

so that there might inevitably be a heavenly, beatific blossoming,
so that Eden might flourish anew,
eternally …

(Copyright 2013. All Rights Reserved. Lynn D. Morrissey)

Lynn D. Morrissey, is a Certified Journal Facilitator (CJF), founder of Heartsight Journaling, a ministry for reflective journal-writing, author of Love Letters to God: Deeper Intimacy through Written Prayer and other books, contributor to numerous bestsellers, an AWSA and CLASS speaker, and professional soloist. She and her beloved husband, Michael, have been married since 1975 and have a college-age daughter, Sheridan. They live in St. Louis, Missouri.
You may contact Lynn at words@brick.net.
Please feel free to comment to Lynn on this post, as she will be checking comments. We appreciate feedback and your responses to her work.
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