Sunday, January 22, 2012
John Hartford, "Gentle On My Mind"
I want to get to that place (if there is such a Cockaigne as that place) where I can think of Harvey as gentle on my mind. However, I want to remember specific details (beard a roughening coal pile, for example). How do I reconcile the giving up of grief without the giving up of memory, especially tactile memory?
Eavan Boland writes in her oft-quoted poem "The Pomegranate,"
If I defer the grief, I will diminish the gift.
Is that true? Universally true? How do you keep memory alive and lively without being overwhelmed?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
I think maybe there is an element of guilt in this thinking. "If there is less grief does that mean I did not love?"
Which of course, is in no way close to the truth.
Besides that, I don't think it is even humanly possible to direct our grief, our memory in ways that diminish the love, the gift.
But what do I know?
Not a hell of a lot.
Post a Comment