Gone
Posted on | December 19, 2011 | 1 Comment
It seems that most of us know someone who is suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease or some form of dementia that robs them of their mental capacities even as their bodies continue on. Sometimes the disease alters their personality. Other times it simply brings out features that may have been buried while they bustled about with their life. But it is always heartbreakingly hard for the caregivers, for those who love the one who is slipping away behind curtains of forgetfulness. As I reflected on this life path, a few words emerged that I thought I would share with you to capture my own feelings about this difficult life passage.
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Tower whistling at its corners in the wind,
flower waving in a symphony of celebration,
stallion lunging heavy breathing ready for the jump,
tree whispering with patient supplication,
boat slopping over choppy waters, clapping under sail,
seashell crooning reminiscence of the deep,
All gone.
Now nothing
but the wind,
the same familiar wind,
wild,
warm,
enveloping,
blowing over empty ocean,
empty land.
Man still here
mind gone.
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William J. Everett
In my teaching career I authored eight books and numerous articles in social ethics and religion. After over thirty years of academic work — in Germany, India, and South Africa as well as in the United States — I wanted to turn my hand to a poetically written novel to probe the issues of ecological and human reconciliation.
When I am not writing, I create furniture for worship settings. For more about my work, go to www.WisdomsTable.net, where you will also find galleries of artwork by my wife Sylvia, whose ancestors were the original inspiration for Red Clay, Blood River. READ MORE...
Red Clay Blood River
Red Clay, Blood River is a story told by Earth about two brothers from Germany and an enslaved South African woman whose lives bind together America’s “Trail of Tears” and South Africa’s simultaneous “Great Trek” of 1838.
December 19th, 2011 @ 6:46 pm
Yes, from my observation the change in personality, sometimes almost a reversal, is very hard. When such a one dies, it is like having lost a loved one twice.