Day 16.173: Sunday; remembrance

Our church service this morning was on the subject of grief, and we met in a rainy cemetery. The weather wasn't what anyone planning an open-air service would have wanted, but it seemed appropriate enough to me.

I've been conscious all week of the anniversary of my mum's funeral (Day 15.165) and she was very much on my mind as we engaged with grief in community among the graves of others.

As I walked, I also recalled this, that I wrote on the day of a memorial service that I could not attend for a school friend back in 2019 - the service was called a "Last Remembrance" - and the occasion sparked these lines:

They call it a “last remembrance” but of course it is no such thing.

The memories will come

Again

And again,

Wanted and unwanted,

Bringing sometimes joy, sometimes dismay.

The Earth continues to turn

So the long shadow of your time in this world will fall here and there.

As long as we still live, the remembrances will continue.

 

Blossom falls from a tree onto some grave stones on a rainy day in a cemetery