I lost a dear friend two days ago, one who was practically family. I turn to Shakespeare’s “Fear no more the heat of the sun” for solace.
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Tag Archives: death and dying
Fear No More the Heat o’ the Sun
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Fear no more the heat of the sun", Cymbeline, William Boyd, William Shakespeare | Comments closed
Covid Costs Us Loved Ones’ Final Words
Among the many tragedies related to Covid is how family and friends are missing out on final words. Many literary works touch on the importance of this last encounter.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Aeschylus, Agamemnon, COVID-19, death bed words, Henry Fielding, Richard II, Song of Solomon, Tom Jones, Toni Morrison, William Shakespeare | Comments closed
Remembering My Son 20 Years Later
Remembering my oldest son, who died 20 years ago, I turn to Shelley’s elegy for Keats.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Adonais, Alfred Lord Tennyson, death of a child, In Memoriam, Percy Bysshe Shelley | Comments closed
The Sun Rises in Spite of Everything
A Derek Mahon poem read on Irish state television assures us that “Everything Is Going to Be All Right.”
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Everything Is Going to Be All Right", COVID-19, Derek Mahon, Illness | Comments closed
The Old Wild Place Beyond All Shame
My friend Sue Schmidt alerted me to this Easter season meditation by Richard Rohr that uses a David Whyte poem to explain what Jesus meant when he said, “Anyone who wants to save his life must lose it. Anyone who loses her life will find it.” Rohr believes that Jesus is not calling for people […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Old Wild Place", David Whyte, Nature, Resurrection, Richard Rohr | Comments closed
When Great Souls Die
Tuesday Today is the 19th anniversary of my oldest son’s death. When Justin died in a freak drowning accident in 2000, our world turned upside down. He was 21 at the time and would have been 40 this year. In “When Great Trees Fall,” Maya Angelou captures much of what I experienced. I’m struck by […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "When Great Trees Fall, Beowulf, death of a child, Grendel's mother, grief and grieving, Maya Angelou | Comments closed
Along the Flower Trail We Shall Go
Spiritual Sunday My mother lost her favorite cousin on Friday, a woman who somehow managed to remain upbeat for years despite a brain tumor. I’ve been reading Music of the Sky: An Anthology of Spiritual Poetry and found five short poems, all of them heartrendingly beautiful short poems, that I hope will bring comfort to […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Empty-handed I entered the world", "It is above that you and I shall go", "Pure Morning Dew", "Seventy-one!", "What Is Life", Chief Isapwo Muksika Crowfoot, Dogen Kigen, Kabayashi Issa, Kozan Ichikyo, Wintu poet | Comments closed
R.I.P. Mary Oliver, Bride of Amazement
Friday Mary Oliver, who died yesterday, may have been America’s favorite poet. I taught her Pulitzer Prize-winning American Primitive for over 20 years in a nature-focused Introduction to Literature class and so have seen up close her impact on readers. When death has entered my own life, I have often turned to Oliver’s poetry. For […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Blossom", "In Blackwater Woods", "In Pinewoods Crows and Owl", "The Fish", "University Hospital Boston", "When Death Comes", Lost Children, Mary Oliver | Comments closed
Refusal to Mourn a Death by Fire?!
How do we process the deaths caused by California’s Camp Fire? Dylan Thomas’s scandalously title “Refusal to Mourn” offers a way.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Refusal to Mourn the Death by Burning of a Child in London", California fires, Camp Fire, Dylan Thomas, mourning | Comments closed