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Laura B.'s avatar

I read a poem by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer this morning called "There is Only the Field" in which she talks about the death of her father. These lines have stayed with me today:

When death arrives, I want to bring

my softest self. I won't bargain,

but I will tell death it's taking the best of us--

the one who worked hardest to survive.

I guess it is getting older that is making me softer to death. Not welcoming it, such to say, as to recognizing the way a life gives back in death, in the ways you describe this dear whale doing so. Much the same way we carry the wisdom and goodness of our loved ones who have passed with us. Trommer's poem ends with these lines:

I want to tell death, "You don't get all of him.

I carry in me his goodness, his courage.

While I live, he will always be alive in this field."

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Ian Haycroft's avatar

Thank you Sydney. We can forget the solemn 'neath the beautiful. Thank you for so beautifully reminding us. I think if I was the person who discovered the "boings" in the language of whales I would want it on my headstone as a final celebration.

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