Since returning from India…when the noise and company of people faded…grief pinned me down with a force I never knew existed. I realized how lonely grieving is. Condolences stop coming, calls never ring because it’s too uncomfortable to speak to a person who experienced the death of a loved one… I feel I am on two parallel journeys… one of remembering my beloved mother, honouring her love and memories. And another of discovering that I failed as a human to accumulate quality relationships. If there’s anything that provides comfort in this time, it is that your grief be seen. Perhaps it is egotistical to want that, but isn’t it fundamental to the human experience to come together as a community to celebrate, so why not when a tragedy befalls us.

A heart heavy with grief and a head dizzy with disillusionment, I seek comfort in words. Discovering ‘For Grief’, a poem by John O’Donohue felt like an Aha moment. Yes, this is how I feel. A rollercoaster of emotions…. anger, regret, pain, love, gratitude, longing…
I know love expands our hearts. I thought grief would dent it. But on the contrary, I find that my grief has expanded my heart too, making room to love my mother doubly more, heal from the pain of the missed moments with her, and forgive the situations and circumstances and human that didn’t serve or support me during this time.

I will persevere. I will be fine. Mumma lives on in my heart, even though it feels unbearable some days to realize she is no longer on this earth with me. But she raised strong, kind women. Even in grief I hope to live up to her upbringing.

—–

For Grief

—by John O’Donohue

When you lose someone you love,
Your life becomes strange,
The ground beneath you becomes fragile,
Your thoughts make your eyes unsure;
And some dead echo drags your voice down
Where words have no confidence
Your heart has grown heavy with loss;
And though this loss has wounded others too,
No one knows what has been taken from you
When the silence of absence deepens.

Flickers of guilt kindle regret
For all that was left unsaid or undone.

There are days when you wake up happy;
Again inside the fullness of life,
Until the moment breaks
And you are thrown back
Onto the black tide of loss.
Days when you have your heart back,
You are able to function well
Until in the middle of work or encounter,
Suddenly with no warning,
You are ambushed by grief.

It becomes hard to trust yourself.
All you can depend on now is that
Sorrow will remain faithful to itself.
More than you, it knows its way
And will find the right time
To pull and pull the rope of grief
Until that coiled hill of tears
Has reduced to its last drop.

Gradually, you will learn acquaintance
With the invisible form of your departed;
And when the work of grief is done,
The wound of loss will heal
And you will have learned
To wean your eyes
From that gap in the air
And be able to enter the hearth
In your soul where your loved one
Has awaited your return
All the time.

—by John O’Donohue, To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings