Dear trendygran, I am sorry it has taken me a while to reply to your lovely post. Thank you for your kind words. You are right, of course, these losses never go away completely. I tend to think of these more sensitive times as grief blips - I know I am stronger long-term and even though there are these raw times, I also know I come back from them more quickly. And hard as they are, I think they are also reminders that the love we have had is not lost - it is because we still feel it that we mourn from time to time. At my daughter's funeral we had the reading 'On Joy and Sorrow' by Kahlil Gibran - it has great truth to my mind and I am positing it below. In my eulogy for Evelyn, I spoke of her as 'Our delight' - so the sorrow is deep, but we also remember her with many smiles,
Janice xx
On Joy and Sorrow
from
The Prophet
by Khalil Gibran
Then a woman said, Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow.
And he answered:
Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.
And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.
And how else can it be?
The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.
Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter’s oven?
And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?
When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.
When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.
Some of you say, “Joy is greater than sorrow,” and others say, “Nay, sorrow is the greater.”
But I say unto you, they are inseparable.
Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.
Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy.
Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced.
When the reassure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his silver, needs must your joy or your sorrow rise or fall.