December 1: At A Loss for Words, Maya Angelou, "When Great Trees Fall"

I am still at a loss for words over the death of my friend's daughter.  I've seen my parents endure the loss of two of their children.  It's not an easy thing to witness.  Parents aren't supposed to outlive their kids.

I know that I've published the poem below on another occasion, but, today, it speaks to me on a very deep level.  That's what all great poems do.

Saint Marty doesn't know how to help pick up the pieces from this, so he'll let Maya Angelou do it. 

When Great Trees Fall

by:  Maya Angelou

When great trees fall,
rocks on distant hills shudder,
lions hunker down
in tall grasses,
and even elephants
lumber after safety.

When great trees fall
in forests,
small things recoil into silence,
their senses
eroded beyond fear.

When great souls die,
the air around us becomes
light, rare, sterile.
We breathe, briefly.
Our eyes, briefly,
see with
a hurtful clarity.
Our memory, suddenly sharpened,
examines,
gnaws on kind words
unsaid,
promised walks
never taken.

Great souls die and
our reality, bound to
them, takes leave of us.
Our souls,
dependent upon their
nurture,
now shrink, wizened.
Our minds, formed
and informed by their
radiance,
fall away.
We are not so much maddened
as reduced to the unutterable ignorance
of dark, cold
caves.

And when great souls die,
after a period peace blooms,
slowly and always
irregularly.  Spaces fill
with a kind of
soothing electric vibration.
Our senses, restored, never
to be the same, whisper to us.
They existed.  They existed.
We can be.  Be and be
better.  For they existed.