Passages

 Those of you who follow my blog might have wondered where I was all month.
 Well it's been a hard month filled with emergencies and grieving 
 My husband's Mother left us on the 7th. She was an amazing woman, powerful and soulful in so many ways. She left behind a legacy of writing that we are now in this process of compiling into an anthology so that this body of work will continue to inspire and move generations to come. We mourn her loss though we know she is at peace and free from the troubles of this life. Not soon after she passed I received a message from my childhood best friend. She told me that she is dying of cancer. The odds were low for treatment. She chose quality of life. I support her decision though my heart cries. Although we had not been close in recent years we had spent most of our formative years from childhood to the tumultuous teens having adventures and living life as best friends do...Here I am at a loss for words at the moment to describe such a connection as we shared. 
 All of this brings me to the subject of this post; passages. Spring is a time of budding and new growth. To look at loss in such a time feels so wrong yet here we are. I know that many of you who may be reading this have faced losses or are going through this. This pandemic has cost so many lives and in it's magnitude has put so much focus on the fragility of human life itself. Soon  more and more of us are getting vaccinated and will be able to reconnect with loved ones and go out cautiously into the world. This is amazing and wonderful! There will be in time celebrations as we reach a place of higher immunity. Still there will also be times of profound sorrow for all of the lives lost. At this times we see only numbers, facts and figures...Human life is indeed a gift we should cherish and be thankful for everyday we are here in this world.
   This month saw these holidays pass and here I will list those to come in it's waning days. As always I apologize for omitting any that you observe as there are so many festivals in this big beautiful world we share
    Passover concluded April 1st-4th 
    with Good Friday on the 2nd 
    and Easter on the 4th
    Ramadan began on the 13 and will conclude May 12th 
    and on the 22nd we celebrate Earth Day 
    
   In honor of Earth Day and our dear Phyllis Larrabee I am sharing this poem by her 
      May we all be well and be blessed 

     Our Mother The Earth Is Grieving 

     Our Mother the earth is grieving 
     Her tears are the rain 
     Melting the ice
     The breast of her daughters which feed desire 
     Love and milk for her children are wounded 
     We can be so ill and still love the sirens of technology 
     Which do not need to be our enemy 
      But...
     The fossil fuels whipping earth and air and 
     The earth so wounded...
     Yet every spring so far
     The living earth 
     Even in her hospice 
     Rises to feed us 
     To delight us 
     The rivers-where do they get their song?
     Racing past our grief 
     And the flowers, how they rise up and open 
     And we hear the cries of newborn lambs 
     And our own 
     And wonder to see the innocent youth rise up to save 
                  this mother  

     from Usagi 'Poems of Changing Seasons 
     ~Phyllis Larrabee~ 2018