“Faces I have grown to love

Voices so dear

Early morning light dancing in to our room

Illuminating our Souls

Voices so dear

Kindred spirits on the Quest for the Holy Grail

Illuminating our souls

This gift of gathering

Kindred sprits on the quest for the holy grail

Voices blending into a joyous chorus

This gift of gathering

Where teachers and students become one

Voices blending into a joyous chorus

Singing a hymn of praise

The breath uniting the body, mind and spirit

Trusting our own inner voice

Yes, singing a hymn of praise

The breath uniting the body, mind and spirit

Motion becomes its own delight

As silence signs the hymn

On the faces I have grown to love…….”

Death is nothing at all

I have only slipped away into the next room

I am I and you are you

Whatever we were to each other, That we are still

Call me by my old familiar name

Speak to me in the easy way you always used

Put no difference into your tone

Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow

Laugh as we always laughed, At the little jokes we always enjoyed together

Play, smile, think of me, pray for me

Let my name be ever the household word that it always was

Let it be spoken without effort, Without the ghost of a shadow in it

Life means all that it ever meant

It is the same as it ever was

There is absolute unbroken continuity

What is death but a negligible accident?

Why should I be out of mind, Because I am out of sight?

I am waiting for you for an interval

Somewhere very near,  Just around the corner, 

All is well.

Nothing is past; nothing is lost

One brief moment and all will be as it was before 

How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!

       Canon Henry Scott-Holland, 1847-1918, Canon of St Paul's Cathedral

     Just as you requested, Mom, we spread half of your ashes in a beautiful stream in the Jemez. It was the last place we went together before you had to go to the ICU that last time, remember?  It was a beautiful fall day, the leaves were turning, the Aspen's were gold, the sky was full of sun and a cloudless blue.  When we took your ashes there it was sunny and beautiful, just like the day we found it together.
     Arjuna and Rachel were there with little Finley and Noah, as well as Lizzie and Andy.  Noah delighted in putting "Tutu's special dirt" in the stream over and over again, accidentally sending some on the wind, all over his coat, and into my face as I was standing behind him.  "Oh no, I have Mom in my eye," I laughed and cried at the same time.  You would have laughed hysterically (maybe you were) at this one silly moment amongst the reverence and remembrance of the rest of the occassion.

Mother,
These portraits you left behind
are half-truths at best.

Their stiff, still frames ignore
the spinning, shining, beating blur

of your heart
dancing with mine
in a circle of years
turned miniature magical moments