Readings from The Day of the Dead service

by Rev. David Usher

November 1, 2015

Antoine de Saint-Exupery:

Bit by bit, nevertheless, it comes over us that we shall never again hear the laughter of our friend, that this one garden is forever locked against us. And at that moment begins our true mourning, which, though it may not be rending, is yet a little bitter. For nothing, in truth, can replace that companion. Old friends cannot be created out of hand. Nothing can match the treasure of common memories, of trials endured together, of quarrels and reconciliations and generous emotions. It is idle, having planted an acorn in the morning, to expect that afternoon to sit in the shade of the oak.

e. e. cummings:

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

                                                      i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

…it is important to honor the dead, especially those with whom we have had a close relationship.  The soul is not limited in its experience to the confinements of life.  Death doesn’t erase a relationship, it simply places it in a different context.  Fostering our relationships to the dead gives the soul its nourishment of eternity, melancholy, mystery, and the kind of relatedness that is not literally of this world.  Many, many stories of the soul tell that it is not fully at home in this life and that it is always trying to break the bonds of this world’s limitations.  We can honor the soul by nurturing our relationships with the dead…

They are not gone who pass beyond the clasp of hand, out of the strong embrace.  They are but come so close we need not grope with hands, nor look to see, not try to catch the sound of feet.  They have put off their shoes softly to walk by day within our thoughts, to tread at night our dream-led paths of sleep.

They are not dead who live in hearts they leave behind.  In those whom they have blessed they live a life again.  And shall live through the years eternal life, and grow each day more beautiful as time declares their good, forgets the rest, and proves their immortality.

With you a part of me hath passed away;

For in the peopled forest of my mind

A tree made leafless by this wintry wind

Shall never don again its green array.

Chapel and fireside, country road and bay,

Have something of their friendliness resigned;

Another, if I would, I could not find,

And I am grown much older in a day.

But yet I treasure in my memory

Your gift of charity and young heart’s ease,

And the dear honour of your amity;

For these, once mine, my heart is rich with these.

And I scarce know which part may greater be —

What I keep of you, or you rob from me.