The sun shines.
I feel like I have been on a long journey and perhaps I have. Certainly my dreams were of boats, planes, ships, and trains.
I'm not sure how to describe the Tibetan Buddhist ceremony for Mitchell. It was emotional, profound. Perhaps what I "got" was that though I have come to understand that we on earth are all connected, and though I feel that those who have died are connected to me, I am more clear that we actually are one "mind," and I'm not completely sure what that means, but though the purpose of the ceremony was to let Mitchell go so he can choose his next steps, we are still connected in some broader sense. Again I feel this, and I don't have words to describe what now surrounds my heart like a halo, and that is this moment. Impermanence. What brings the next .....
I understand that it is important to let Mitchell go, and I am amazed at how much it hurts to do so. I had not realized how much I wanted to hold on to him, how much comfort I feel from him, and seeing his picture and his name burn up on the altar, was very painful for me. What does Mitchell represent for me? Perhaps my father, perhaps all fathers. Though a child, he was wise.
I am again reminded of the poem by William Stafford, those last lines that guide my life. Perhaps I see them stretch now, like the string of a kite, farther than I am now allowed to see.
An Afternoon in the Stacks
Closing the book, I find I have left my head
inside. It is dark in here, but the chapters open
their beautiful spaces and give a rustling sound,
words adjusting themselves to their meaning.
Long passages open at successive pages. An echo,
continuous from the title onward, hums
behind me. From in here the world looms,
a jungle redeemed by these linked sentences
carved out when an author traveled and a reader
kept the way open. When this book ends
I will pull it inside-out like a sock
and throw it back in the library. But the rumor
of it will haunt all that follows in my life.
A candleflame in Tibet leans when I move.
- William Stafford
I am exhausted, as though I've run a marathon. Perhaps in distance covered, I have.
Letting Mitchell go is stretching the weave of my loom. I feel particled and waved.
I love him very much, and love means I let him go, and we all know that is the challenge of love, and that brings me to Blake. May we each care for ourselves each day.
- William Blake
Blessings for us all!