My friend Alan Paskow is in his final days. Although not in a coma, he appears in perpetual sleep, and each day his breathing is more labored. Thomas Hood’s poem “The Death Bed” captures some of the experience of waiting and watching.
Tag Archives: death and dying
A Place of Parched and Broken Trees
My friend Alan Paskow is finally dying. The poem that comes to mind is Mary Oliver’s “Universal Hospital, Boston.” All around nature is thriving, a contrast with the clean antiseptic rooms within the hospital. The contrast shows up as well in the patient’s eyes, which “are sometimes green and sometimes gray,/and sometimes full of humor, but often not.”
When Events Defy Human Understanding
As I wrote last year when the earthquake hit Haiti, all human language, even literature, comes up short when faced with disaster and death. Literature is language by humans about humans, and destruction on this scale seems to laugh narrative and image to scorn. Nevertheless, being human, we try to bring even apocalyptic disasters into a […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Hap", Bacchae, Bridge over San Luis Rey, Euripides, Japanese tsunami, Suffering, Thomas Hardy, Thorn Wilder | Comments closed
Remembering My Son through Alyosha K
Spiritual Sunday Several times over the past few months I have rhapsodized over Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov, feeling a little bit like Keats upon first reading Chapman’s Homer. “Then felt I like some watcher of the skies/When a new planet swims into its ken,” the poet writes, perfectly capturing the experience. One reason I like the novel is […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Brothers Karamazov, death of a chld, Fyodor Dostoevsky | Comments closed
A Sweet and Virtuous Soul Chiefly Lives
Spiritual Sunday Last week I wrote about how my friend Alan, beset with cancer, has been exploring the meaning of love as his health fails. Here’s a beautiful George Herbert poem that captures Alan’s love for creation, his sadness that he must leave it, and (perhaps) his sense that his love may transcend death. Even […]
Finding Love while Dying
From time to time I bring you updates about my friend Alan Paskow, currently failing because of cancer. Julia and I visit the Paskows every Sunday night. Julia administers a Reiki massage to Jackie while Alan and I converse. In our recent visits, Alan is always in bed when I talk to him. Our conversation […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Altruism, Aristotle, Julian of Norwich, love, Molly Peacock, St. Paul, Thomas Aquinas | Comments closed
Life from the Vantage Point of a Deathbed
I haven’t updated you for a while on my friends Alan and Jackie Paskow, former St. Mary’s colleagues. Alan has been suffering from terminal cancer for close to three years now, and Julia and I visit every Sunday night. Julia performs Reiki massage on Jackie while Alan and I talk. This past Sunday, while […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Brothers Karamazov, death of a child, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Nature, Religion, Spirituality, Thomas Aquinas | Comments closed
In a Fairy Castle, an Invitation to Life
On Saturday I wrote about how Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the 14th century Arthurian romance, demonstrates that our fear of death keeps us from living as fully as we could. The Green Knight’s promise to us is that, if we change the way we approach death, we will live life with heightened intensity […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged living a full life, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight | Comments closed
No Coward Soul Is Mine
Here is a resolute poem of faith in the face of death by Emily Bronte, who I wrote on this past week. When she died three years after composing it, she did so with a fortitude that showed that she wasn’t just spinning words. Perhaps it can fortify others going through tragedy and loss. […]
