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Some time ago I wrote an article for Hello Grief about grief and music. The article received a number of comments and lists of additional songs that have helped others on their grief journey. This response has emboldened me to share what, for me and others I know, is a similar power for healing that can be found in poetry.
Poetry is not for everyone, but it works for me. Like lyrics in a song (which is poetry set to music), it can speak to the heart in ways that prose cannot.
I once read a poem at a Comfort Zone Camp Saturday night bonfire, where we say good by to loved ones lost. The poem’s title is “Lost” and is based on a Native American legend of advice from an elder to a youth. Later that evening, a teen with Down’s Syndrome asked me if she could read it at the Sunday memorial service. “I often feel lost since daddy died in the tower,” she said, “and the words helped.” I was incredibly touch when she read it.
Mary Oliver, one of our poet laureates, writes, “Poetry is prayer, it is passion and music, it is beauty, comfort, it is agitation, declaration, it is thanksgiving…Often poetry is the gate to a new life…It brings new thoughts or welcome remembrance of old ones. It offers simple pleasure, complicated joy, and even, at times, healing.”
Of course poetry is really meant to be heard and not just read. If you want to explore whether or not poetry is for you, I suggest going to YouTube, and searching the word “poetry.”* If you like it, then go to the library or book store, and check out an author that spoke to you. Some will make you laugh or smile, others will touch the sad part of you, and a few will open your eyes and heart to life.
Here’s a taste from poems that speak to me on my grief journey. I hope they will speak to you as well.
Lost – David Wagoner (To me, the message of this poem has been “Stand still” – quiet down – it may be different for you).
Stand still. The trees and the bushes beside you
are not lost. Where ever you are is called Here,
and you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
you are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
where you are. You must let it find you.
The Dead – Billy Collins1 (I read this in the local paper the day after 9/11)
The dead are always looking down on us they say,
while we are putting on our shoes or making a sandwich,
they are looking down through the glass-bottom boats
of heaven as they row through eternity.
They watch the top of our heads moving on earth,
and when we lie down in a field or on a couch,
drugged perhaps by the hum of a warm afternoon,
they think we are looking back at them.
Which makes them lift their oars and fall silent
and wait like parents for us to close our eyes.
Heavy – Mary Oliver2 (Written after the death of her life-long partner)
That time
I thought I could not
go any closer to grief
without dying.
I went closer,
and I did not die.
Surley 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 is 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
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?
When Death Comes –Mary Oliver (Reminds me to make the most of life, and of my mother and others who made the most of out of their lives)
When death comes
Like the hungry bear in autumn,
When death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse
To buy me, and snaps the purse shut;
When death comes like the measle pox;
When death comes
Like an iceburg between the shoulder blades,
I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
What is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?
And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,
and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,
and each name a comfortable music in the mouth,
tending, as all music does, toward silence,
and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.
When it is over I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was a bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.
When it is over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made my life something particular and real.
I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.
I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.
If poetry also speaks to you, and has helped you in your grief journey, please share with me and the group as a comment below.
* * * * * * * * *
*On YouTube, check out the Geraldine Dodge Poetry link for exceptional poetry readings by some of the world’s most recognized modern poets.
1 Sailing Alone Around the Room -2001
2 Thirst -2006
11 Comments:
Thanks for your thoughts. Here are a couple of my favorite poems:
Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glint on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you wake in the morning hush,
I am the swift, uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft starlight at night.
Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there, I do not sleep.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there, I did not die!
~~ Mary Elizabeth Frye
Earth teach me quiet ~ as the grasses are still with new light.
Earth teach me suffering ~ as old stones suffer with memory.
Earth teach me humility ~ as blossoms are humble with beginning.
Earth teach me caring ~ as mothers nurture their young.
Earth teach me courage ~ as the tree that stands alone.
Earth teach me limitation ~ as the ant that crawls on the ground.
Earth teach me freedom ~ as the eagle that soars in the sky.
Earth teach me acceptance ~ as the leaves that die each fall.
Earth teach me renewal ~ as the seed that rises in the spring.
Earth teach me to forget myself ~ as melted snow forgets its life.
Earth teach me to remember kindness ~ as dry fields weep with rain.
~~An Ute Prayer
“When it is over…I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.”
What a beautiful reminder to each of us to be present, to take things in, to be active participants in our own lives, no matter what has happened in the past.
Bill, once again, your words & the way you share the words of others has touched my heart. Thank you.
Such wonderful poems! Each strikes a note with me and makes me recall that I too can write, and should. It’s all just a bit too close right now so as someone wrote “Waiting is.” In the meanwhile, I’ll visit here frequently and find these words that help me express myself. Bless you all!
I just did a Missionaries Conference and the title was “Grief: A Butterfly’s view and vision. Although I have taught grief Sessions for ten years and and did my DMin thesis on Grief, I had never focused on the future after a grief experience. I have written poetry as a response to death and dying for more than 25 years and I beleive I found this site because God is guiding me to take this grief work to a level of the buterfly’s view and vision.
A Restored Butterfly for Wy
I sit here trying to understand why
The time came and you used your wings to fly
I know that the circle of life includes a move
It seems that the move came so very soon
O Sweet Butterfly wrapped in pretty paints
Did you get a call to go with the saints?
O lovely Butterfly with wings of flight
I wish I could see you this night
O Restored Butterfly, no matter how I try
I can’t stop thinking and I have to cry
But you know I love to see you fly
Yes. Yes, Yes,
You are a Restored Butterfly for Wy
Written 2001/ Revised 2010
The following is a poem written by my son for his sister, who died after a 2 year battle with cancer. We are grieving her loss, she died only one month ago.
My Sister the Fighter
Cancer picked a fight with my sister.
But what cancer did not know was that my sister is a fighter.
She fought and fought cancer
And so cancer decided to start a war.
Cancer started a war with my sister.
But what cancer did not know was that my sister is a warrior.
She battled and battled against cancer
And so cancer decided to go on a crusade.
Cancer went on a crusade against my sister.
But what cancer did not know and does not know and can never know
Is that my sister is an Angel.
And in that place where she now resides, not cancer nor any other torment
Can touch her ever again.
My wife’s death from cancer over 10 years ago was and will always be the most traumatic experience in my life. I’d never written poetry until her death, but felt compelled to do so thereafter. Here are two of my poems:
IN MY HEART
by Stephen Fleharty
I’ll never kiss your lips again
Nor touch your soft and tender skin.
Not look into your eyes of blue
Nor whisper secrets just we knew.
I’ll never see your smile so bright
Nor sense your breathing late at night.
Not share the future’s bold frontier
Made with plans we held so dear.
My love for you will endure.
Of that, I am very sure.
And although we are far apart,
Forever is where you’re in my heart.
You had to leave, not wanting to,
Gone to a place that we both knew
Was finer even than this life
Which has times of woe and strife.
The years we spent, I will cherish
Until the day that I, too, perish.
On that day, we’ll start anew
The love that bonded us so true.
My love for you will endure.
Of that, I am very sure.
And although we are far apart,
Forever is where you’re in my heart.
WHAT NOW?
by Stephen Fleharty
Twilight is past and darkness reigns.
The mem’ries of light, too, fade.
The future predicts unbridled pain
For me – a masquerade.
Awake, I face fate’s cruel test
Of bearing one more day,
The absence of your loving breast
And your sweet bouquet.
Love is strong, yet can’t deny
The embers that remain
Will fail to soothe my mournful sigh,
Which I cannot contain.
My days are spent as one destroyed
And wondering without hope
Of why I cannot fill this void
And why I cannot cope.
‘Til death doth claim me and my soul
I shall love thee still.
‘Til then it is my lonesome role
To accept God’s will.
I just want to say how much I am moved by your response. What wonderful sentiments and poetry from the heart. I know they will speak to others who visit here.
When my sister lost her husband in March the grief for her was so great she died just 4 months later. I was haunted and healed by this song which I think captures what she must have felt the last 4 months of her life.
Hurricane
Mindy Smith
I felt the faint trace of thunder
Rattle this old house
I saw the fire light the sky
But there’s no sign of rain anywhere
I need a hurricane
To empty out this place
Seems its the only way
To salvage any sense I have left to move on.
I’m waiting to hear your voice again
And lighten up this heart
I’m holding on to stupid memories
But I see you in every little thing
I need a hurricane
To straighten out this place
It may be the only way
To salvage any sense I have left to move on
I need a hurricane
To ravage through this place
Think it’s the only way
To salvage any sense I have left to move on
I felt the faint trace of thunder
But there’s no sign of rain anywhere
No, there’s no sign of you anywhere
i wrote this for my husband a few months after he died,he died at home from multiple organ failure following an mrsa infection.
i miss your face, kiss your head, hold your hand, hear your voice,touch your skin,feel you close, help you, hold you, speak
your name, all forbidden pastures in my pain. wishing, praying,standing, walking, staying in the moment, trying so hard for you baby..i love you.
i also wrote this for Ian.its called…
PRECIOUS.
a moment in time, a look, intertwined,
a stroke of my face, how you walk at my pace,
you catch my eye, across the room, and suddenly, im not alone,
an understanding of expression, no need for words, magical unison.
a dance, our story, mesmerising,
a captivating whirl, a breathless girl, precious,
the most precious thing i ever touched, and parted with