For the Living

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 spare as she was when she left my side, and she is just as able to bear her 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

But what of the living?

For a long time, I stand gazing toward the horizon, hoping to see that speck of white cloud returning from some temporary voyage.

Nothing.

For a time, my friends stand with me. Their words have given way to the sound of crashing waves. Words that for a long time have fallen on ears made deaf by grief; for grief is all I hear.

Eventually, all others depart, but still I stand with eyes fixed on the darkening horizon.

The sun sets, and night descends. I am alone. Even the moon has chosen not to cast its light upon my sorrow.

Eventually, the strength to stand gives way to fatigue and sadness. I sit upon the sand.

Watching.

Waiting.

My tears have dried, but still I cry in grief as my eyes strain against the darkness.

Searching.

As the last of my strength wanes, the light of morning begins to break upon the shore, at first an echo of the glorious light of a forgotten day, then brighter, brighter grows the light; perhaps the brighter as its rays hit my tear-worn, sleepless eyes.

And with the sun, I hear a whisper on the wind and waves, “I may be gone, but please, please go on living.”

I strain against the sound of crashing waves, hoping yet again to see that speck of white cloud upon the waves; hoping to hear that sweet voice again.

But I know my beloved is gone.

Behind me, I hear the sound of people, each of them completely aware of the grief that brought me to my knees on the horizon of life. It is grief they know; that they carry.

Noise.

Laughter.

Love.

Life.

I must go on living.

I gather strength from the light, the breeze, and the life around me and rise from the sand.

I will never forget the grief I feel at the passing of my beloved until the day I too set sail.

But for now there are many reasons for me to live.