Finding Peace: Yom Kippur Yizkor 5781

 It has been 9 years since my father died – and there isn’t a day that I don’t think of him. His death came slowly. It was cruel.  Alzheimer’s Disease robbed him of his memories, his dignity and his ability to connect with those who loved him

Many people have said that the process of mourning is like a journey.  Each step takes us further away from the immediacy of loss  And yet, each day also reminds us of our loved one’s absence – as the moments we want to share with them become reminders of the fact that they are gone:

§  Milestones

§  Birthdays

§  Successes

§  Failures

§  The times when we crave their presence the most are also poignant moments of awareness of their absence

But I’ve learned something over these past 9 years – something important that is not unique or new – but it is vital nonetheless.  You see, as years pass and the immediacy of loss becomes more and more distant, it is replaced with a sense of Shalom

The time that has passed has allowed me – and my family – and everyone who knew and loved and was loved by my father – to focus, not on his illness and death, but rather, to reclaim him in his prime – to give thanks for the gifts he bequeathed to us – his laughter, his caring, his creativity and his goodness.

There is a saying that time heals all wounds.  That’s not true.  Time does not and cannot heal.  What time can do, however, is to provide us with us perspective. It helps us to see that grief and loss, while very real, are only one part of the totality of the reality of the relationships we shared with those who have been taken from us.  To only focus on their absence is to deny the power of their presence – and the gifts they have bequeathed to us

The Hebrew word, “shalom” does not only mean peace.  It also means completeness and fulfillment.

We find Shalom  - when the missing pieces in our lives are gathered together  - when we are given the gift of understanding how events, emotions, experiences and encounters combine to form a mosaic of meaning and incredible beauty.

Grief creates a hole in our soul – a deep wound that never fully heals – and is reopened with each subsequent loss we experience and the longing that accompanies them

And yet, there is a healing. The pain of the immediacy of loss can evolve into acceptance and gratitude. And this can lead us to Shalom – to wholeness

As we think about our loss, we can give thanks for the blessing of having known, of having loved and been loved by those who were taken from us.

Memory can be a gift when it allows us to realize that the pain and loss we equate with the death of our loved ones is just one part of the totality of a life that was fully lived.

I saw my father for the last time a few months before he died. He didn’t know who I was then – and that was hard. But the empty shell who barely occupied the bed in which he lay was not the sum of his existence.

The passage of time – the gift of these past 9 years – has given me the gift of retracing his life – and my own life as well. We are forever entwined – not only in memory – but in the values and the legacy that he bequeathed to me and I, in turn, have been able to pass on to my family.

I wrote the following poem shortly after that last visit:

My Father Has Hazel Eyes © Joe Black July 6, 2011

My Father has hazel eyes.

I’d like to think when he was younger

He could see a world of wonders

With an emerald sheen

In between

The hardship and the hope

The need to fight or cope

With a panoply of lies.

 

My father’s skin is smooth

Though easily bruised.

He stares into a distant

Seeing. Not seeing.

Being .  Not being.

Perhaps recalling for an instant

A time

When legs and lips and loins competing

Jingling pocket sounds completing

A trajectory of mine.

 

My father, always singing

(Telling me that he was there).

With ancient rhythms mingling

Through our home and in the air.

His laughter pierced the sadness

His anger deep below

His love was filled with gladness

And his heart did overflow

His hopes lay in his offspring

And his dreams were locked up tight

With every day an offering

Whistling praises in the night.

My father’s voice is gone now

Like a winter’s lawn now

Or a debt repaid

Or a bed unmade

Waiting to be stripped

A hand that’s lost its grip

On the world that spins around him

Or the people that surround him

Preparing their goodbyes.

 

My son has hazel eyes.

He sees with intuition,

A clarity of vision

Searching hard for things that matter

Amidst the riffraff and the chatter

In the greenish hues of spring

In the songs he loves to sing

And every day a new surprise.