All the cemetery images in this collage were taken on my last visit to Parklawn where my parents are buried.  The angels are photographed from a souvenir print I brought with me from Italy that has nothing but angels. The African Violets were taken at my friend’s apartment.  Events of the past few weeks have turned my thoughts to death and dying.

I received news of the death of someone close and was saddened by the news and also relieved that the person’s suffering was over.  Cancer is never easy.  I felt grief for the wife and children of this individual and also felt the sense of loss that we all feel when a person we once knew moves into the realm of invisibility.  We are also reminded of our own mortality.  As John Donne said:

“Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”

Death is the longest journey – we go and we don’t come back.  When we go on other trips, there is a return date.  While we’re travelling, we know that the journey will end with a return to where we left.  Family and friends await our return.

With death, we aren’t planning for a return journey.  At birth, we make an appearance, and, at death, we make a disappearance.  It’s a long Bon Voyage, Au Revoir, Goodbye.  Depending on the wisdom tradition we adhere to, we all have different speculations about what happens after.  However, we are still left with the question:

WHERE DO THEY GO?

Do they become a star

And roam amidst

The endless galaxies

Of space and time?

Do they twinkle

To beckon us to join

The chorus of the countless hosts

In concert with the music

Of the celestial spheres?

Do they become archangels

Ministering forever

With everlasting praises

Before the throne of God?

Or guardian angels

Sent to heal

To soothe and raise

The bruised, the weak

The weary and the fallen?

Do they become a flower?

A rose perhaps-

Shedding her marvel

Beauty, colour and perfume

And blooms and dies,

And blooms and dies,

And blooms………?

 

This poem was written by my father later in life although he was raised as a Christian with the belief in heaven and eternal life.  It expresses his questionings and also my own.  Perhaps, we all have questionings of our own about this journey to the unknown.  Bon voyage, au revoir, goodbye!