2019
Loss
The Privilege of Knowing, before it is Time,
Is hard to appreciate when things are fine.
An instant passes, through all of the years
And your emotions erupt, in a cascade of tears.
You think of what needs to be done and said,
But in tortured confusion, you crawl into bed.
You awake feeling better - your Healer worked hard,
Then Reality floods back, and you start to retard.
You think of the things, that you would like to be done;
A hand-knitted sweater - and a photo' with dear old mum.
Your responsibility to others, again makes you sad;
Anticipating feelings, before telling sister, brother and dad.
Disbelief beckons, locking away all their fears -
It's a lot easier they decide, to hear with deaf ears.
You explain it's a Privilege - hardly anyone's told.
Come to terms with Reality - be Upright and Bold.
Say what's to be said, and do what's to be done,
We have a short time only, before mum is gone.
Your mourning has started, and it's difficult to cope.
She looks healthy and happy - you're filled with false hope.
As the month's pass by, you decide it's not true,
'till Time arrives, and mum's heart fails her on cue.
You find strength to sustain you, through the burial Ordeal;
Wearing your sweater, you wonder, how She now feels.
You start feeling better, Sensing that now, She IS fine.
It WAS a privilege Knowing, before It was Time.
At Nov '89...
This is an interesting poem for me to look back at/upon...
I found myself writing it during a period of time when my Spiritual journey took me through Christian Spiritualism...
Three months, six months, and then a year passed by without 'dear old mum' passing over to the other side of Life ('popping her clogs', if you will) - causing me to put such presumed Inspiration down to the machinations of badly/negatively aligned mischievous 'spirits', and moving on with my life...
However, more recently, i was perhaps Reminded that some years after finding myself writing/'penning' such a poem, my 'dear old mum' reportedly had what is often referred to as a 'near-death (out-of-body) experience', whilst in hospital suffering from heart problems...
She was undergoing an operation (on/for her heart presumably), when she reportedly found herself near the ceiling of the operating room, looking down and across the room at her prone and unconscious body...
She reportedly heard one of the specialists saying with obvious concern (one presumes), 'we're losing her'...
Amid a flurry of presumed and later reported/conveyed activity, mum then saw/witnessed a rather large needle being apparently thrust into her chest - followed by a silver coloured wrapping(???) being put around her body...
She then noticed her previously 'deceased' Father appearing across the room, at a similar level/height to herself - He apparently then simply shook His head from side to side, as if to say 'it's not your Time yet'...
'Dear old mum' then reportedly found herself awake in her hospital bed (presumably the next day???), pondering over such seemingly strange presumed remembrances - vowing to share them with the later visiting team of specialists, in order to possibly verify such presumed remembrances as being reflective of reality / real events...
In the event she did so, only to receive affirmation that such events did indeed take place, and then being reassured that such an 'event' was far from being an isolated case/incident - years later i heard(???) that sometimes hospital staff have put a rather unusual, and perhaps brightly coloured, object upon a tall cupboard, for example, within such operating rooms, in order to perhaps receive some objective feed-back(???) whenever such 'events'/remembrances have later been said to have occurred...
Anyway, much more recently, i have found myself pondering upon such shared/recounted 'dear old mum' experiences - and, rightly or wrongly, wondering if/whether such a seemingly Given poem was indeed Spiritually correct, at least from the Perspective of the presumed/seemed 'Giver'/Inspirer of such a poem, at the time of writing/'penning' it...
Did That which we most commonly refer to as 'God', later(???) Decide, out of a Feeling of Love (???)/Compassion(???)/Justice(???) perhaps, that if 'dear old mum' had 'passed over' to the other side of Life at the time of her operation, that she may perhaps have found herself abiding within a Place not of her liking??? (she was far from being in a 'happy place', within her mind, at the time after all - due to the effects of a series of previous unwelcoming life experiences perhaps) - and further more, did He/She(???) in His/Her(???) Great Wisdom, Realise that further experiential time, here on planet/Mother Earth, would bring 'dear old mum' within a level of balance/harmony that would assure her a Residence of a much(???) Pleasing manner, i find myself wondering (incidentally, 'dear old mum' did in fact experience a rather mark-ed uptick in her sense of well-being, some years later, upon the 'death' of my father (her former husband) - a somewhat sudden change within her being that really surprised me at the time btw)...