A Poem

[Spengler]

I was going through my wife's things today and found a wall plaque with the following poem on it. Strange, how appropriate it is.

 

The Thing Is

to love life, to love it even

when you have no stomach for it

and everything you've held dear

crumbles like burnt paper in your hands,

your throat filled with the silt of it.

When grief sits with you, its tropical heat

thickening the air, heavy as water

more fit for gills than lungs;

when grief weighs you like your own flesh

only more of it, an obesity of grief,

you think, How can a body withstand this?

Then you hold life like a face

between your palms, a plain face

no charming smile, no violet eyes,

and you say, yes, I will take you

I will love you, again.

 

-- Ellen Bass

[LeannC45]

On 8/23/2018 at 3:19 PM, Spengler said:

I was going through my wife's things today and found a wall plaque with the following poem on it. Strange, how appropriate it is.

 

The Thing Is

to love life, to love it even

when you have no stomach for it

and everything you've held dear

crumbles like burnt paper in your hands,

your throat filled with the silt of it.

When grief sits with you, its tropical heat

thickening the air, heavy as water

more fit for gills than lungs;

when grief weighs you like your own flesh

only more of it, an obesity of grief,

you think, How can a body withstand this?

Then you hold life like a face

between your palms, a plain face

no charming smile, no violet eyes,

and you say, yes, I will take you

I will love you, again.

 

-- Ellen Bass

Wow, this poem is very intense and true to how this experience feels. Probably not a coincidence that you found it.