MAY 30
Grief melts awayLike snow in May,
As if there were no such cold thing.
—GEORGE HERBERTWe thought it would never happen—that this grief would
never ease, let alone melt away.
Yet grief, like the snow, does melt slowly away, until one
day, perhaps to our surprise, we realize the landscape has
changed—the snow has gone. Grass and stone and flower
beds are visible again. Similarly, our grief seeps slowly away,
until one day we realize we are feeling better—almost like
ourselves again.
To extend the metaphor—the melting snow, which became
water, has gone on to nourish this or other ground, depend-
ing on how the land lies and where the earth is thirstiest.
Or perhaps the moisture is caught up in the clouds, to drift
over the sky and then to descend again to water other lands.
In the same way our grief becomes transmuted into other
forms of energy and life. It will continue to be part of the
system of our life and the lives of those around us, depend-
ing on circumstances and where the need is greatest. It will
not be lost. It will be transformed.
I will entrust to the processes of life this grief which lies so cold
against my heart.