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I hope you find something here to comfort your grieving heart. Please visit any time.
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THANATOPSIS: A Meditation On Death
From the Greek word thanatos meaning 'death personified'
Truly it is in darkness that one finds the light, so when we are in sorrow,
then the light is nearest of all to us. Johannes Eckhart
On this page...
Young Americans
September 11, 2001
When Parents Die
No Ordinary Lives
Gone From My Sight
W.C. Bryant's Thanatopsis
Related Links: Loss, Support and Hope
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YOUNG AMERICANS
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In late July, 2008, we reached a grim statistic(*): 4124 young Americans have died in Iraq, and 557 Americans have died in Afghanistan, since the start of the war. The death toll continues to mount every day in Afghanistan and Iraq. It is a profound loss of youth and human potential.
At least 30,435 US troops have been wounded in action in Iraq. The American injury count in Afghanistan stands at 2257.(**) Many of the wounded soldiers are permanently maimed. I can't express in words the personal sacrifice and pain of war.
(*) Source: CNN count (July 29, 2008)
(**) Pentagon estimate (July 29, 2008)
My thoughts and prayers are with the families of the brave young men and women in uniform who have given "the last full measure of devotion" in service to their country. May the God of your understanding wrap loving arms around you and grant you peace.
To those who continue to serve in the US Armed Forces:
Thank you for your courage and sacrifice, stay safe, and return home soon to happy reunions.
To learn how you can offer tangible support to our soldiers and their families, please visit
the links at the bottom of this page.
The Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors, TAPS, offers comfort and unique resources for military familes left behind when their loved ones are killed in the line of duty. Includes an online community and photo gallery. See www.taps.org for details. Thank you.
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From Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:
Life is real, life is earnest,
But the grave is not its goal.
'Dust thou art to dust returnest'
Was not spoken of the soul.
Longfellow also penned the poem below during the long anguish of the Civil War:
And in despair, I bowed my head,
"There is no peace on earth," I said.
"For hate is strong, and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, goodwill to men."
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep;
"God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail,
With peace on earth, goodwill to men."
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HIGH FLIGHT
By John Gillespie MaGee, Jr.
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies in laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds--and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of--wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew--
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.
John Gillespie Magee was a fighter pilot during World War II. He was killed in action two weeks after penning this poem.
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REMEMBERING SEPTEMBER 11, 2001
He who learns must suffer. And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God. Aeschylus, Greek tragic dramatist
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It has been a long time since that horrific day, but it will take eternity to comprehend unspeakable loss. Grief is a deep wound, much like a burn, that can heal with time, but is never the same again. Individual stories of love, sacrifice and courage have emerged from the ashes of 9/11. These accounts show us that healing (with scars) does occur, in its own season, in its own way.
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INTERREGNUM
By Helen Duke Fike
The span between life and death
Can be as quick and sudden
As a puff of wind
That blows out a candle.
But the candle does not suffer
After darkness comes.
It is the person
Left in the dark room
Who gropes and stumbles.
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Pass to thy Rendezvous of Light,
Pangless except for us--
Who slowly ford the Mystery
Which thou hast leaped across!
Emily Dickinson
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FROM AN UNKNOWN AUTHOR:
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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 cry.
I am not there, I did not die.
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FROM THE BHAGAVAD-GITA:
I am the self abiding
in the heart of all creatures;
I am their beginning,
their middle and their end.
Know that my brilliance,
flaming in the sun,
in the moon, and in fire,
illumines this whole universe.
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To all those who suffer still, I send:
Deep peace of the running wave to you.
Deep peace of the flowing air to you.
Deep peace of the quiet earth to you.
Deep peace of the shining stars to you.
Deep peace of the Infinite Peace to you.
(Adapted from Gaelic Runes)
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WHEN PARENTS DIE
Death ends a life, but it does not end a relationship. Robert Anderson
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My father died in 1994. My mother died in 2006. I grieved my father's death, but it was easier because I still had Mom to comfort me. Her death leaves me with the deepest heartache I have ever known.
There is no right and wrong way to grieve because the journey is personal. We each must find our own way through the darkness. Poetry and prose console me. May the words below help you, too.
Whether positive, negative, or a combination of light and dark, the emotions that bind us to our parents are strong. When our parents die, our complex emotions live on. Some of us mourn the loss of enduring love. Some of us grieve for lost potential: what could have been, and never will be.
I once read that we never fully grow up until both our parents die. By this definition, I have officially reached adulthood and I don't like it. A friend sent me a beautiful poem of change when Dad died, and the death of a parent changes us in unexpected ways. I share it here:
MY FATHER'S DEATH
By May Sarton
After the laboring birth, the clean stripped hull
Glides down the ways and is gently set free,
The landlocked, launched; the cramped made bountiful--
Oh, grave, great moment when ships take the sea!
Alone now in my life, no longer child,
This hour and its flood of mystery,
Where death and love are wholly reconciled,
Launches the ship of all my history.
Accomplished now is the last struggling birth,
I have slipped out from the embracing shore
Nor look for comfort to maternal earth.
I shall not be a daughter any more,
But through this final parting, all stripped down,
Launched on the tide of love, go out full grown.
Grief holds the promise of healing through the darkness, but sometimes, the pain of loss is so intense, it is hard to see the light. The passage below is from the book How to Survive the Loss of a Parent by Lois F. Akner, CSW, with Catherine Whitney. (William Morrow and Company, NY, 1993, p. 193)
Death takes away. That's all there is to it. But grief gives back. By experiencing it, we are not simply eroded by pain. Rather, we become larger human beings, more compassionate, more aware, more able to help others, more able to help ourselves.
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NO ORDINARY LIVES
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My father was a World War II veteran serving with the 165th Infantry, 27th Division, Pacific Theater of War. He earned the Purple Heart on Saipan and survived the Battle of Okinawa, called the last and bloodiest battle in the Pacific.
Dad was a member of the "Silent Generation" and he rarely spoke of combat, except to call it "bloody hell." My father was a deep well of mystery to me when I was a child. In adulthood, I have come to understand that my young eyes could not see him through the lens of the war that shaped the rest of his life.
The American soldiers overseas during WW II experienced the "universals of war" as documentary film maker Ken Burns describes it: They were often too cold, too hot, lonely, bored, or hungry; living in putrid conditions, scared out of their wits; doubtful, at times, of the decisions the military leadership was making; bad things happened on both sides; they were fighting under horrific circumstances; or witnessing the violent deaths of fallen comrades wondering when a mortar shell with their name on it would come down--and they acted with courage anyway.
To quote from the description of Ken Burns' WW II documentary film entitled The War: "By focusing on the personal stories of ordinary Americans who had extraordinary experiences, the film tries to bring one of the biggest events in the history of the world down to a very intimate scale. And in the end, we all begin to see that there are no ordinary lives."
To learn more about Ken Burns' PBS World War II documentary series, now available on DVD, and the people who rose as a generation to answer the call to duty in a world gone mad, please visit:
www.pbs.org/thewar
Near the end of his life, and for the first and only time, Dad wrote of his World War II experiences. I have posted his stories on a PBS TV affiliate site in his home state of Ohio. To read one GI's encounter with the Pacific Theater of War, go to:
In His Own Words
The two links above do not open new windows. Use your back button to return here.
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GONE FROM MY SIGHT
By Henry Van Dyke
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I am standing upon the seashore. A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the morning breeze and starts for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength. I stand and watch her until at length she hangs like a speck of white cloud just where the sea and sky came to mingle with each other.
Then someone at my side says, "There, she is gone!"
"Gone where?"
Gone from my sight. That is all. She is just as large in mast and hull and spar as she was when she left my side and she is just as able to bear her load of living freight to her destined port.
Her diminished size is in me, not in her. And just at the moment when someone at my side says, "There, she is gone!" there are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices ready to take up the glad shout, "Here she comes!"
And that is dying.
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FROM A POEM BY ERNEST CHRISTOPHER DOWSON:
They are not long, the days of wine and roses:
Out of a misty dream
Our path emerges for a while, then closes
Within a dream.
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The final lines of THANATOPSIS
By William Cullen Bryant
So live, that when thy summons comes to join the innumerable caravan which moves to that mysterious realm where each shall take his chamber in the silent halls of death, Thou go not, like the quarry slave at night, scourged to his dungeon, But sustained and soothed by an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave like one who wraps the drapery of his couch about him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
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RELATED LINKS: Loss, Support and Hope
All links below open new windows.
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The first link below offers support or information about grief and healing. The APA gives compassionate advice for managing grief and traumatic stress after an act of terrorism or natural disaster. Freedom isn't free: Fisher House is dedicated to serving our wounded troops and their families. Operation Shoebox helps soldiers overseas. Some wounds are invisible and Welcome Back Veterans assists young Americans with the long journey home. TAPS is a resource for the military families left behind. May we all find some measure of comfort in the dark.
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My E-mail: TheGrievingHeart@aol.com
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Learn US Flag Etiquette
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Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. George Santayana
© Copyright 2008 Christine Jette. All rights reserved
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