Sunday Book Review – Upon Departure – Prose and #Poetry by John Roedel

I was introduced to the poetry of John Roedel by my lovely friend, Jane Sturgeon. Roedel writes heartfelt poetry from his soul. As a writer myself who writes raw from my soul, and as a griever, John’s poetry hits the mark with everything he writes. Upon Departure is his newest release I was eagerly awaiting to read. Roedel’s storytelling through prose and poetry is sure to touch anyone who has ever loved and lost.

Blurb:

From bestselling poet, storyteller and speaker John Roedel, comes a collection of poetry that explores the concept that our grief as a natural wonder that terraforms the landscape of our world in increments. It can take a lifetime to find peace when our loved one becomes an empty chair at our kitchen table.

let’s lace our hands
as if eternity is opening
up the veil into the great
mystery right in front of us

let’s feel our fingers against
each other as if this is the
last time we will touch before
we become celestial kites

let’s part our lips and say
what we should have said
to each other years ago:

“I love you.
I love you so.
I forgive you.

I’m sorry.
I’m blessed to know you.
I’m so grateful to you.”

My 5 Star Review:

Upon Departure is one of the best books I’ve read on heartfelt poetry, and on loving, life, and losing. After reading, Untied – the poetry of how knots become strings, also by Roedel, and as a writer myself, and one who is also living through grief, I will say that Roedel’s poetry speaks to me louder than some of the other many books I’ve read on grief. And this is simply because the rawness and realness of his pain jumps off the pages, especially to those of us who have also walked the walk – and are still walking through the haze of grief.

In this new release of prose and poetry, the book begins with a short introduction to Roedel’s journey of losing his father, the whirlwind of emotions, the unacceptance and disbelief, till the final acceptance, the ‘what ifs’ of doing things differently he experienced, and how the lingering effects continue through his own journey through life. In this beautiful book, you won’t find a table of contents, nor will you find titles of each poem, rather a story in prose spoken through poetry of words that paint pictures of loss, loving, hope, and eternal love, in metaphors. For anyone who loves emotional poetry, looking for comfort in poetry, or seeks a path in understanding grief, this is a book for you.

x

poem #1 begins:

“I don’t care what form

you return to me

I just want you back”

The poem continues on with stanzas about how Roedel doesn’t care in which form ‘you’ appear to me in various appearances:

“If you come back to me

as our favorite song on the radio

I’ll pull the car over immediately

and let the music retell our love story

on 80s power ballad at a time…”

“If you come back to me

as a row of goosebumps on my bare arm

I will trace my fingers across my skin

Carefully so I can read the love letter

you wrote to me in spirit braille…”

“If you come back to me

As a passage in a book

I will grab the fattest eraser I can find

And get rid of all the periods so you

Can become a run-on sentence…”

x

One of my favorites, Poem #10, grief summed up in a post card:

“Your grief is the purest love letter that you can ever send to the one you have lost to death…every tear that rolls down the grooves on your face is the most tender postcard you will ever write…”

x

Poem #12

“…everybody that you have lost along the way

returns to you on your last day

-it turns out that

love is a boomerang.”

x

Roedel has another wonderful book titled, Hey God, and wrote another excerpt for this book:

#13 – Me: Hey God…

“Grief keeps sneaking up on me.

God: To grieve means that you have loved. Grieving is one of the truest human experiences that you will ever participate in. It often arrives without warning – like a late-day summer storm – obscuring the sun and drenching you in downpour. It’s a gift, isn’t it?”

“…Bereavement is the debt you must pay for having loved. There is no getting over the loss of a beloved who is now resting in the arms of endless love. Grief has no expiration date. Despite the pass of time, the phantom pain of mourning is always one memory away from returning.”

x

From poem #15

“Every tear of

Loss that we shed

Carries with it

The DNA-of the relationship

Of the love

Of the story

That two people

Once shared…”

x

Poem #16 might be my favorite:

Tells about the writer stating he’s just a tourist in the world, and writes of all earthly experiences and possessions he’ll leave behind:

“…except for my

thoughts of you

-they are coming with me…”

x

Poem #22 – Where the author uses metaphors likening grief to a field of “rosebushes and bees”

“…Grief is a stretching field full

of thick beautiful rose bushes

and bees that you must travel

through to get to the other side…”

“…On the other side of the field of

grief is another – even bigger field

of grief that has even more beautiful

rose bushes and even angrier bees

and even more pointy thorns that you

must get through…”

x

Poignant moments:

“Being mortal means that we are all caught in a loop of meeting each other at Baggage Claim…”

Roedel goes on to say “To grieve the death of a beloved isn’t something that we check off in a box. Once we experience grief it changes us forever. Grief transforms us. Grief doesn’t just stay for a weekend, Grief moves into the loft of our hearts…”

“Grief isn’t an obstacle we overcome – it’s a masterclass in what it means to be human.”

“It can take a lifetime to find peace when our loved one becomes an empty chair at our kitchen table.”

“Life is life

there can be no after

for something that never ends…”

“…because love is the act of holding hands with

another person and counting to infinity by twos…”

“There is this unspoken call for us to have our wounds become scars long before they are ready to.”

“To grieve means that we have taken the risk to love without fear.”

“These tears are proof.

Of what?

That I loved.”

“It’s okay, my love. Eternity is holding me. Death isn’t an end. Death is a threshold. I’m still here. I never left. Love doesn’t die. I remain. There is no afterlife. There is only life. I’m here wih you. Love doesn’t die.”

“…After somebody that you love dies, it feels as if you have lost a limb. Even years later there can be phantom pains that can send you to your knees…”

©DGKaye2022

Signs – Suddenly, #Dragonflies

On my weekly visit to my husband’s (our) grave last week, I saw something I’d never seen before. Oh sure I’ve seen the odd dragonfly in my lifetime, but this time I saw five of them.

Whenever I visit my husband, I plant myself down on our grave to have a chat with him, or read to him. As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t actually feel him there as much as I do when at home, but there is usually always a sign he gives me that he hears me and knows I’m there. Every time I talk to him while there, a light, or sometimes gusty wind will blow. I know this is how he communicates with me while outside.

Once, when I had gone there to visit, shortly after his funeral and the snow had melted, I couldn’t find his grave. I drove over to the office so they could pinpoint it for me. I was all flustered in my already anxiety and still shocked state when I couldn’t find him, and when I finally did, I sat down on his holy ground and cried.

Another time I visited, it was a rather calm day weather-wise, but a huge wind picked up when I looked up at the sky, as though the wind was a messenger, letting me know, he knows I was there. After the visit when I got back into my car, I turned on the radio that had been off during the drive there. The channel switched to the 50s station on Sirius XM on its own – his favorite, and one that I never appreciated listening to. The song playing was Johnny Cash – I Walk the Line. My husband loved Johnny Cash. I stopped the car and from my tears, broke out in laughter and said out loud, “You little bugger, I know that was you.” And my heart felt at peace in that moment as I drove off.

I have experienced this wind or breeze many times in many different places outside when I speak out to him. I also find various feathers on my path when walking outside and various coins show up at home when I’m looking for something else . But last week was something different. As I cleaned up the dead flowers I’d laid there two weeks before, I looked up at the sky, and for a good ten to fifteen minutes, I watched in splendor, as five large dragonflies circled back and forth and round in circles way above my head. Their beautiful gossamer wings sparkled through the sunlight. It was mesmorizing. They kept flying, but never left my orbit. I’ve always been drawn to dragonfly symbols, knowing they have a magical connotation, but not knowing exactly what they represent. So of course, I had to look it up:

Most definitions will tell us that the dragonfly symbolizes spring, rebirth and renewal. And different countries around the world seem to have their own specific definitions. The Celts relate them to fairies, in Japan they represent transition from summer to winter, in China they represent good luck and love. In Vietnam they say dragonflies are weather predictors. But collectively, most people deem them a spiritual symbol of rebirth and transformation, not unlike the butterfly, that emerge from larvae and turns into something beautiful.

Dragonflies only live for a short time once they are transformed, signaling, life is short so live it up. With their near 360 degree vision, they see all around them, offering the ability to see beyond what any human can. Ultimately, all interpretations will tell us that when we see a dragonfly, it’s a reminder to break free, reinvent, transform into what we want to be, reminding there is beauty in freedom, and freedom is short-lived so live in the now. That is my interpretation from all the information I’ve taken in.

Seeing five of these beautiful creatures way above my head circling around for all those minutes felt like, once again, my Puppy was sending these messengers to let me know it’s okay to go forth and transform. I know this in my soul. I just feel stuck still in my heart.

One more sign: As I mentioned earlier, I believe my husband announces his presence to me through wind. Another day last week while at the pool, surrounded by nature, he greeted me with a very welcome breeze on a steaming hot summer day. I thanked him for the beautiful, much needed breeze, and asked him to let me know it’s really him communicating with wind by sending me a butterfly. An hour later a baby Monarch butterfly flew right onto my left arm close to my shoulder. I sat there for a few minutes while my heart felt joy as we communed together, knowing very well that my husband answered my call.

©DGKaye2022

Sunday Book Review – Journey of Souls by Dr. Michael Newton

Welcome to my Sunday book review. Today I’m sharing my review for a fascinating book – Journey of Souls, written by Dr. Michael Newton. In this book, the doctor shares with us his studies of 29 patients he has hypnotized and taken back into past lives between physical deaths and reincarnations.

Blurb:

Learn the latest details and most recent groundbreaking discoveries that reveal, for the first time, the mystery of life in the spirit world after death on Earth—proof that our consciousness survives—in Journey of Souls by Michael Newton, PhD.

Using a special hypnosis technique to reach the hidden memories of subjects, Dr. Newton discovered some amazing insights into what happens to us between lives. Journey of Soulsis the record of 29 people who recalled their experiences between physical deaths. Through their extraordinary stories, you will learn specifics about:

  • How it feels to die
  • What you see and feel right after death
  • The truth about “spiritual guides”
  • What happens to “disturbed” souls
  • Why you are assigned to certain soul groups in the spirit world and what you do there
  • How you choose another body to return to Earth
  • The different levels of souls: beginning, intermediate, and advanced
  • When and where you first learn to recognize soulmates on Earth
  • The purpose of life

Journey of Souls is a graphic record or “travel log” by these people of what happens between lives on Earth. They give specific details as they movingly describe their astounding experiences.

After reading Journey of Souls, you will gain a better understanding of the immortality of the human soul. You will meet day-to-day challenges with a greater sense of purpose. You will begin to understand the reasons behind events in your own life.

Journey of Souls is a life-changing book. Already, over 600,000 people have taken Journey of Souls to heart, giving them hope in trying times.

My 5 Star Review:

This book was a fascinating read. As a person who believes in the afterlife, and after losing the love of my life, I was drawn to this book to help ease my curiosities about what happens on the other side. Is there another side? Indeed there is!

Dr. Newton himself claimed to be an atheist but spent many years studying patients using past life regression taking them back to before their births and after their deaths asking questions about life in the next realm, how they are greeted there, what they learn, and how their choices are made to reincarnate into their next lives. This book is like an intimate journal into the journey to the afterlife. Dr. Newton claims his initial interest into reincarnation was purely out of intellectual curiosity, until he worked with a young man on pain management. He explains the various levels of trance people go into that are neither dream stage or hallucination and when he regressed patients back to their ‘soul’ state, they were able to communicate their responses about the spirit world. “Death does not break our continuity with the immortal soul of those we love simply because they have lost the physical personhood of a mortal body.” Soul spirits are said to be masses of white light that whirl around. Souls are made up of energy. The human body dies, but energy doesn’t die.

In this book through case studies, we will learn that souls have the ability to divide their essence so that they can be in more than one body while on earth. This answers the question about, if we reincarnate, how will our loved ones be there to greet us when our time on earth comes to an end. We are told that when a new soul enters the afterlife, they are given a review of their life before moving on and meeting lost loved ones. He talks about evil wrongdoers who will have karmic lessons to learn in the next life. When choosing our next life, there is an agreement made to not remember a past life, because learning is better from a clean slate. Souls in different stages of progressing in the next life, emit different colors of spirit according to which groups they are in. We learn that some souls choose to never go back to earth for another life. We learn that every soul who chooses a particular new life has a motive for choosing that life, and that there is usually some kind of a karmic reason, whether pleasant or painful, the soul seeks when choosing their next life.

Dr. Newton speaks about the people we meet in our earthly lives that will fulfill our lives, and our soulmates, saying although these meetings may seem coincidental, they aren’t really coincidental, but pre-destined. Those ‘deja vu’ moments we sometimes experience when meeting someone new are often related to knowing them in a past life, they are often referred to as ‘signs’ placed in our minds in our spirit life, to ‘jog’ our memories later in life as humans. It’s like a prepping in the afterlife, because we won’t know this once back on earth. We learn that souls do in fact retain sensory memories. This could definitely be a reason why a certain scent, song or smell will remind us about someone or give us a familiar feeling with somebody we just met in this life.

The good doctor even goes into about when a soul reincarnates into a new baby, and what happens if a soul chose a baby that was stillborn or aborted. Case studies tell us what it’s like to be in the womb. Much is also explained about why innocent little children have the ability to see spirit, and many who claim to have ‘imaginary’ friends.

This book affirms that our journey here on earth is not limited to our physical bodies, but so much more about where we came from, and where we go once our time on earth here is done.

©DGKaye2022

Colleen Chesebro Announces The Word Craft #Poetry Contest Winners

Colleen Chesebro ran a contest in June using syllabic poetry, using the theme, ‘dreams’. There were certainly some fantastic entries, and winners. Congratulations to Diana Peach for her gorgeous entry. Today I’m sharing my Tanka prose and poem I wrote for the contest. Tanka is written in 5 lines in 5/7/5/7/7 syllables, and the prose relates to the poem.

~ ~ ~

When love is deep, there can’t be measure. The longing for lost lovers never dissipate, but linger in shadows of dreams as we live out the rest of our lives, awaiting glorious reunion.

Waiting

Lost love yearns for time,

Space where all is linear.

Grief seeps into dreams.

Undying love never fades.

Clocks echo love eternal.

..

Visit Colleen’s blog to see the list of winners and their entry poetry.

I’m thrilled to announce the winners of the Word Craft Poetry Syllabic Poetry Contest held to honor the Summer Solstice. The theme was dreams, and the syllabic form to write was tanka prose. Many thanks to all the poets who entered this contest. Thanks for being part of our poetry community… Please visit Colleen’s Word Craft to view the winners and their poetry at:

https://wordcraftpoetry.com/2022/07/13/announcing-the-winners-of-the-word-craft-poetry-syllabic-poetry-contest/#comment-116380

©DGKaye2022

Sunday Book Review – Ending Forever by Nicholas Conley

Welcome to my Sunday Book Review. I was thrilled to receive a copy of this book through Netgalley once I read my friend Olga Miret’s review about it, Ending Forever by Nicholas Conley. It’s not too far out of my genre range, considering it’s a fictional story that deals with the afterlife – although in sort of a science fiction sort of way. I typically have been reading nonfiction books on the subject. And since this story has so many elements to it and deals with my top favorite subjects – compassion, humanity, love and grief, and so much more, I had to give it a read, and I loved it. The author himself in his acknowledgments states his book is, “strange, surreal fiction that doesn’t really fit into any specific genre box”.

Blurb:

Axel Rivers can’t get his head above water. Throughout his life, he’s worn many hats — orphan, musician, veteran, husband, father—but a year ago, a horrific event he now calls The Bad Day tore down everything he’d built. Grief-stricken, unemployed, and drowning in debt, Axel needs cash, however he can find it.

Enter Kindred Eternal Solutions. Founded by the world’s six wealthiest trillionaires and billionaires, Kindred promises to create eternal life through mastering the science of human resurrection. With the technology still being developed, Kindred seeks paid volunteers to undergo tests that will kill and resurrect their body—again and again—in exchange for a check.

Axel signs up willingly, but when he undergoes the procedure—and comes back, over and over—what will he find on the other side of death?

My 5 Star Review:

Love the dedication in front of the book: “Dedicated to everyone I have ever lost. Every sunset precedes a sunrise, and what the dead leave behind shapes the future. May the memory of you-each of you- be a blessing.”

Axel Rivers has had a lot of bad things happening in his life, mostly, what he refers to as ‘That bad day’. Down on his luck and funds, and carrying deep sorrow in his heart, he decides to sign up for the Kindred Eternal Solutions experimental program, run by the wealthiest of the elite. Those who’ve suffered hardship and in need of money are the targeted to sign up and receive a big check for taking part in this trial program, along with some of the curious who want to learn what does happen on the other side. Besides the big paycheck for signing up for this series of deaths and resurrections, Axel hopes to be able to see that infamous light so talked about on the other side as well as the privilege to meet up with his dearly missed lost loved ones.

These volunteers are put to a death sleep in a chamber and monitored through their temporary death state by doctors and scientists, and are promised to be brought back to life within hours, and must complete the death/resurrection process daily, six times in a row. The program is researching how to keep people alive through eternity, mainly for the purpose of the rich elite who run the program, trying to discover a way to cheat death for themselves.

At first Axel is very apprehensive but the thought of his overwhelming debt is what keeps him in the program. After his first session he feels disillusioned – he saw no light, no lost loved ones, and felt doom from meeting ‘the stranger’. He felt more depressed after the session, feeling as though he had a visitation from a dead family member later that day after first session. He thought it felt so real, not as though it were a spirit. His second session, he felt a breakthrough, met some of his lost loved ones, and saw the ‘Deathweavers’, – the ones in the next realm who make decision about when those on earth’s time is up.

Axel meets Brooklyn, a fellow partipant, single mother who has suffered many hardships in her own life, and they become friends and go out for drinks after day two of the experiment. On day three, Axel is late for that third session and is booted from the program. He decides to wait for Brooklyn to finish, when he discovers, she never showed up to that session. Axel learns from her sister that a tragedy has taken place and Brooklyn’s daughter Gwen is in intensive care dying from it. Axel’s new awakenings through the first two sessions drive him to approach the scientist at her home where he begs her to put him under one more time because he is sure he can bargain with the ‘Deathweavers’ and plead for Gwen’s life, and for her own scientific knowledge purposes, Dr. Carpenter agrees.

In Axel’s last time returning to death and resurrection, he learns a lot about himself and conquers boundaries that he learned he’d created around himself. He manages to get the attention of the Deathweavers and like everything else in life, they would only agree to let Gwen live if Axel gave up something precious of himself.

This book is about the fragility of life, overcoming one’s own tribulations and grief and gaining the selflessness to help another human being. Despite the paranormal-ish basis of the story, the strength of love and compassion shine through people when they are forced to surrender their own hurt and wounds to help the worse off.

The last few chapters were so captivating and beautiful, it was difficult to read without tears.

©DGKaye2022

How Am I Doing? Too Much Solitude isn’t Healthy – #Procrastination and #Grief

It was a year April 7th that I lost the love of my life, my husband, Puppy. And today is his birthday. I’ve been busy painting new rocks to place around his gravestone for his birthday visit. And went over to the garden center to pick up a lovely spring planter.

The sun’s rays were shining brightly in this photo

This past year has been one of The most difficult time of my life. Many days I find myself not coming to grips with anything. When you love deeply, you will grieve deeply. I am on my own way too much it seems and I know with certainty getting away for the winter was my saving grace, being around people – company, always someone to talk to.

Most of my days are spent reading, researching various things from the spiritual to online grief groups, and writing. It may seem I haven’t published anything for quite some time, but the writing has been plentiful and has given me much material to work with from my journaling and the many poems I have written. My procrastination, because of my newly acquired short attention span hasn’t permitted me to do anything concrete with any of it yet, but I’m slowly working on that as I struggle through each day with what feels like a never-ending grief who is my constant companion. I know though, that one day soon I will have much of my writing to share. My grief doesn’t just pop up randomly, but walks with me every minute of the day. Some days I can deflect it off ’till later’ and some days it just gets the best of me. So I continue to live in my mantra of ‘One Day at a Time.”

In my moments of distraction, I find myself running to Youtube listening to angel messages, Mediums, poets, from inspirational things to talks on the afterlife. I’ve been watching a lot of Youtube videos, getting lost in the 70s and 80s lately too. I can listen to that music because it takes me back to some of my most happiest times – the times before I met my husband, so those songs couldn’t set off yet another fresh round of grief. Somedays I find myself having to do anything to distract myself from doing anything productive as my grief is a staunch companion. I find myself always trying to gauge my emotions and watch where my mind goes. If I feel the need to abandon doing something constructive (like writing and getting back to edits so I can publish I book I wrote two years ago), when the weight of my grief reminds its presence, I need to do that in that moment. This is my coping mechanism taking over, and I must listen.

If my soul craves the need to jump over to Youtube to watch a video on the Afterlife, or a music video to take me back to a happier time, I do it. I’m alone much of the time and I thank goodness I’m resourceful because let me tell you, I loved living on my own when I was younger. I had the time of my life in those days with a very active social life. But this time ’round, both the calendar and the couch are equally empty.

I’m okay with music prior to knowing my Puppy, but not yet ready for hearing ‘our’ songs. I passed on the Luther Vandross video – So Amazing, that popped up on the playlist, the one I walked down the aisle to when we married.

I’m getting acquainted with, but not quite used to living alone. Being single in grief at a certain age is nothing like being single in my 20s and 30s, especially when you’re still trying to digest being in the digit ‘six’ club. If I didn’t have my writing to keep me sane, who knows where I’d be. Writing is my sanity, as it seems to have been my ‘go to’ since I was a child. I feel like I’m in a new learning phase of my life where I allow myself to follow my whims instead of putting them on the back burner for tomorrows – those tomorrows that sometimes never come.

But I’m always writing. I probably have enough writing for three new books. The only thing I haven’t yet got back to is my desire to do something with my words. So in the meantime, I keep writing. And I’m actually considering putting some of my writing in podcast that will eventually become part of the book on grief that I’ve been journaling about. The universe will guide me when the time is right. My heart is far from ready yet to reread the thousands of words I have written in these past two years.

My circles in life are considerably smaller. I am grateful for the friends in my life, especially those who’ve ‘stayed’. And equally grateful for my online writing friends here who keep check on me and keep me motivated, informed and entertained. I feel as though I haven’t found a direction yet, so I remain coasting along to whatever the days ask of me without putting pressure on myself. Grief is a strange animal that takes hold of me in a moment’s notice. It distracts, it chokes, it hinders, and somedays it’s just emotionally crippling for me, and it works on its own schedule. Too much alone time is not healthy for a griever. I am trying to work on that too.

I will finish off by saying that procrastination is a well known thing for writers as we often will look for a distraction when the muse isn’t fulfilling. But sometimes, in other aspects of life, procrastination is the very thing that soothes our insanity, and a diversion is just what the doctor ordered.

Happy Birthday to my Heavenly Husband 🧡💔💘

Last of the diehard Toronto Maple Leaf fans – who may just make it this year!

Mexican memories

Love of my life

©DGKaye2022

Death Anniversary – Twenty Years – The Bite. I Love You to the Moon and Back for One Thousand Lifetimes

I love you to the core of my soul.

When you asked me to marry you, my heart held all the joy in the world.

Yet, the fear of the future and concern about how I’d deal if I were to lose you because of our age difference, it frightened me to my soul.

I weighed the odds and decided that another love like ours could never be.

I hugged you in true laughter, and said yes, but I made you promise me at least 20 years.

What a fool I was, short-changing myself and not asking for thirty.

Your promise gave me 22,

That fateful fear that’d sometimes niggled at my mind, came back to bite.

No amount of years would have ever been enough to have to let you go.

I love you now, still, and forever.

I love you forever into the beyond.

God gifted me you, but only on loan. Because he wanted you back.

You were my lesson on love.

I tasted true unconditional love,

A gift that many have been denied the privilege.

You’re a gift that will blanket my heart for the rest of my days.

I love you.

Puppy grave
In my heart forever

One year ago today, I lost the love of my life. I can’t even fathom the thought it’s been one year. It still aches like yesterday. My heart is still heavy, and the missing is a continuous gaping hole in my heart.

Today I will visit my husband’s grave, our grave, and lay a new rock upon the headstone. Although I feel the need to visit his grave, I feel him more when I’m home, or wherever I go, as though he is with me. He sends me lots of signs, so I know this much.

The only thing I’ve learned about heart-wrenching grief, is that it never subsides. Each wave that comes over me is like a fresh wound. It doesn’t get easier, I just learn to dance around it when it hits. I don’t suppose it ever goes away because as long as there was love, there will always be grief for the giant loss that resides in my heart.

Next week I will begin planning a celebration of life for my Puppy, the one Covid restrictions denied him; just like the Covid hospital restrictions that added to his demise. I still carry a lot of anger inside for that.

Ours was a true love story, and such as grief is, the more we love, the harder and longer we will grieve.

In the past year, I watched my husband die daily before my eyes. My heart was ripped, yet I had to carry on taking care of him because it was all I could do. I cast my brokenness aside, held back my tears and wouldn’t even admit to myself that my other half was leaving me. Until he did.

I packed up 25 years of our life together, gave things away and moved two months later. I don’t even know how I did it all, I just felt like I was on auto pilot going through the motions.

It was my friends who got me through the difficult days, allowing me to speak about him, about the pain, without any interruption or words of empowerment. Grievers don’t need all those foofie condolences, they need love and support and an ear to blanket the soul, for there are no solutions. Grief is just a process that one must journey through alone. But ears and hugs go a long way to comfort. So I thank my wonderful circle of friends, both here and at home, and all of you here for your love and support and for giving me back some of the ‘normal’ I need to continue on.

Beloved Puppy

I’m a longggg way from healing, but I’m doing and showing up, and taking in all the moments of gratitude along this painful road. And the only thing that keeps me doing so is believing my husband is still always here with me.

I came across the perfect word while reading things in one of the online grief groups I follow. There is a Portuguese word called ‘Saudade’, pronounced ‘Sodahd’. In the article I read it talked about this being the perfect word for which there isn’t a perfect English translation. But the gist of the word is it means a deep emotional state of nostalgic or profound melancholic longing for something or someone that one loves despite them being gone. It’s akin to the term ‘bittersweet’, a longing for something or someone that will never be again. I too now feel it is the perfect description for my grief. According to Dictionary.com,

saudade

soh-dahd; Portuguese soh-dah-juh ]

noun

(in Portuguese folk culture) a deep emotional state of melancholic longing for a person or thing that is absent:the theme of saudade in literature and music.

I love this new word, it describes well the indescribable longing of grief.

Big Puppy
My Puppy

I haven’t published much in the last few years, during my husband’s illness and his dying, and subsequently, after. But don’t be fooled. I’ve been writing like a fiend. I’ve written many poems, conversations, observations and soul searching thoughts through this journey. Turns out I’m 30K words into a book about grief and love, although written in drafts. One day, when my heart can take it, I will put that book together. For now, I would like to share one of the poems I wrote for my husband:

IF

If I’d held you tighter and never let you go,
When God took you, I’d be there with you now.

If there wasn’t a Covid, and my pleas were heard,
You might have still been here with me now.

If I faced my fear of losing you and told you all I knew of your fate,
Would it have scared you more?

If I had a trillion more days, I couldn’t love or miss you more.

If I wasn’t so broken, I could reminisce our happy times,
Instead of just seeing your pained face and body, in my every thought.

If I could stop this biting pain, I could breathe.

If love could have saved you, you’d still be here with me now.




©DGKaye2022


Fleeting Thoughts: How Do We Wish to Be Remembered?

 

Have you ever thought about when your turn is up on earth, how, if, or what you’ll be remembered for? Not to sound depressing, but just thinking about impressions we leave behind as our mark in the world as our legacies. Will we leave an indelible print on someone’s heart or mind? Will we be remembered for any words of wisdom, humor, quotes or empowering messages?

 

I try not to think about my eventual non-existence in this world and had never really thought about what I’d leave behind in people’s minds and hearts. I have occasionally thought about my not having any natural children through the years, which leaves me wondering if when my time comes, will anyone remember me?

 

What would I like people to remember about me, if asked? Well, I’d certainly like to think that in some small way, the words I leave behind in my books and stories and definitely in my social media footprints may make a difference to someone or many someones as the world goes by. I’d like to think my caring and compassion will occasionally come to mind as a fleeting thought or in discussion by any who may have known me, or perhaps, from my writings, or by some who never knew me. Would all my scribbles across numerous notebooks and scraps of paper be scrutinized? Cherished? Tossed in the garbage?  Will more people read my books after I’m gone, like so many now famous authors of the past who were considered unknowns while they lived? Will anybody ever even remember that I once existed?

 

I wonder if other writers ever think about our writing and what will happen to all the words we leave behind once we’ve fulfilled our purpose on this earth.

 

Do you ever wonder about how you’ll be remembered?

 

Nobody really knows the answer to any of these questions, and of course, me being a curious soul, am just really thinking out loud. But wouldn’t it be interesting if we could actually ‘look down’ after whisked away to another dimension after our time here on earth is done and get a glimpse of how others perceived us and our work?

 

 

©DGKaye2021