~~ by tkbrown 19 September 2020
Midst all the grieving and lamenting with such intensity the heart doth ache. Whom can I trust? The pain, the not feeling is more than this old, feeble soul can take. One disaster hits, and then another. Before I can stand up straight, I smother the screams of anguish inside, and I hide the pain because my neighbor cannot find half of her belongings. How can I scream? I need to be strong and help mend the seam the storm ripped open before something else renders it irreparable. Immense are the threats to my survival, but I am not important right now, and I sigh-- deeply, longingly--and look to the sky. There is death and dying all around me. Ash and charred wood, far as the eye can see and I wonder, how will it ever be the same; and I just want to run, to flee and forget the loss stretching, engulfing all. No home, no business, no feeling to express the emptiness entrenching the dried riverbed; ash coating, drifiting between the stones--gray, forlorn, seemingly afraid to hope for better day. Achingly eyeing the chard remains, desperately recalling beauty--incongruently. This is not a scene one would ever want to revisit. Even new growth could not erase the scars, the memories so scant. As I contemplated the losses our country and my fellow-citizens have experienced this week-- from fires and storms, I grieved with them--for them; and I penned these words as an expression of my condolences. To those not suffering loss at this time, if you are ever in the path of such powerful forces, evacuate! Leave hearth and home! No material belongings are worth your lives! This cannot be stressed too much. The country, the world is already reeling from unfathomable loss, and the grieving process has begun. The five stages of grief: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance have begun. No two persons experience them in the same order or to the same depth. Oftentimes more than one can be seen at the same time. Therefore, no two countries will experience them the same. Denial is not yet past--for us-- here in America! The Anger has begun, mostly in the form of rioting, looting, violence, and mayhem focusing on other areas rather than the death and dying all around us directly related to coronavirus-- in our families and in society. So, the Denial has not passed. It is still going on along with the Anger, and some Bargaining. Expressions of Anger are being blamed on events not truly related to society's loss from the pandemic. It is hard to separate personal loss from societal loss. Is that even possible? I don't think so. Be strong enough to feel--more than the anger! Be strong enough to heal--more, more than yourself! It will take introspection refueled to collectively grieve and to rebuild.
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Photo Above: by Dylan Nolte @Unsplash.com.
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Source: Kubler-Ross, M.D. and D Kessler. (August 2014). “On grief & grieving: Finding the meaning of grief through the five stages of loss.” Scribner. New York. (16 September 2020).
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by tkbrown 