Being Here

In the past couple of weeks, a number of my friends have lost their fathers. In every case it brings to mind how I felt when my own father died, at the relatively early age of 68. Yet, when I saw the "shell" that housed his soul on this earthly plane, I could not really feel that he was there any more. I knew that he had winged his way to another realm - some "where" he would no longer feel pain or sadness or disappointment, but exist purely in the spirit. And when I think of him, I like how my mother puts it, that when she looks out of the window at the trees in the garden - the almond tree in bloom in the spring in particular - she feels his presence. He was so often in the garden, tending it with care, nurturing the vegetables, pruning the roses, installing a complex automatic drip watering system, or sitting smoking his pipe in an old cane basket chair. That's why I like this poem by Mary Frye:

Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there; I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,
I am the sun on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning's hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there; I did not die.

Oneness

Human Family by Maya Angelou


I note the obvious differences
in the human family.
Some of us are serious,
some thrive on comedy.

Some declare their lives are lived
as true profundity,
and others claim they really live
the real reality.

The variety of our skin tones
can confuse, bemuse, delight,
brown and pink and beige and purple,
tan and blue and white.

I've sailed upon the seven seas
and stopped in every land,
I've seen the wonders of the world
not yet one common man.

I know ten thousand women
called Jane and Mary Jane,
but I've not seen any two
who really were the same.

Mirror twins are different
although their features jibe,
and lovers think quite different thoughts
while lying side by side.

We love and lose in China,
we weep on England's moors,
and laugh and moan in Guinea,
and thrive on Spanish shores.

We seek success in Finland,
are born and die in Maine.
In minor ways we differ,
in major we're the same.

I note the obvious differences
between each sort and type,
but we are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.