I am standing upon the seashore. A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the morning breeze and starts for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength. I stand and watch her until at length she hangs like a speck of white cloud just where the sea and sky come to mingle with each other.
Then someone at my side says: “There, she is gone!”
“Gone where?”
Gone from my sight. That is all. She is just as large in mast and hull and spar as she was when she left my side and she is just as able to bear the load of living freight to her destined port.
Her diminished size is in me, not in her. And just at the moment when someone at my side says: “There she is gone!” There are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices ready to take up the glad shout: “Here she comes!”
And that is dying.
- Henry Van Dyke
Someone gave this little poem to me the other day for a service. It was simply beautiful to me at first, as I thought about it I was reminded me of all that is wrong with human beings perception of death. The need to feel that somehow that person still lives, still has importance to someone somewhere, is still creating new memories. We have an overwhelming need to hold onto the life that was lived and it has spawned religion, sorcery, devil worship, belief in ghost and other supernatural fantasies.
I’ve said it before but this poem may inspire me say it better.
A crewman was on board working on pulling in a sheet. As he put the handle into the winch it slipped out of his hands hit the deck and bounced overboard. For a second everyone could see the handle slip down into the water and sinking into the abyss, everyone moved towards the edge as if they could somehow dive in and save it but it was lost. As it continued to sink out of reach and into the endless ocean everyone realized it was gone, no more. And that is Death.
Timothy J Ehrlich
Family Care Specialist
timothy.ehrlich@sci-us.com
(626) 691-2000
