Mrs. Teabody Says One Last Goodbye
Death is a one-way street. All the wishing in the world cannot alter its finality. Loss means sadness and all grief is personal. And while we do wonder and fret over death's impact on all those left behind, what it ultimately comes down to is the fact that someone we love no longer walks this earth. No more texts, no E-mails with laugh-worthy attachments, no wildly inappropriate or absolutely perfect birthday cards, no "you've made my day" surprise visits and no long-planned reunions. Death has taken any and all future plans and crushed them under his foot. And so we grieve. And like the poet says, "It is Margaret you mourn for." We grieve for our own loss, for that gaping chasm in our lives that nothing will ever fill; we grieve for our own mortality. Poet Gerard Manly Hopkins tells us: Spring and Fall: To a Young Child Márgarét, are you gríeving Over Goldengrove unleaving? Leáves, líke the things of man, you With your fresh thoughts care for