TEARS IN THE BUCKET

 THINKING OF MARGARET

Today is the anniversary of my mother's death. February 1 is also the feast day of Saint Brigid- the great Irish saint and patron of  nursing mothers--so it always seemed fit that my mother should die on the date of the  feast of the Queen of the Gaels.  They now call this recurring sadness Grief Work,  In the  Gospel Jesus called it mourning, blessed it and  made a promise:
--"BLESSED ARE THOSE WHO MOURN, FOR THEY SHALL BE COMFORTED."
I would like to recall two poems that speak to  loss and the role of  tears   Just one for today  "Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean---"
tears-

 from The Princess: Tears, Idle Tears

BY ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean, 

Tears from the depth of some divine despair 

Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes, 

In looking on the happy Autumn-fields, 

And thinking of the days that are no more. 

         Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, 

That brings our friends up from the underworld, 

Sad as the last which reddens over one 

That sinks with all we love below the verge; 

So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more. 

         Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns 

The earliest pipe of half-awaken'd birds 

To dying ears, when unto dying eyes 

The casement slowly grows a glimmering square; 

So sad, so strange, the days that are no more. 

         Dear as remember'd kisses after death, 

And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feign'd 

On lips that are for others; deep as love, 

Deep as first love, and wild with all regret; 

O Death in Life, the days that are no more!

MORE POEMS BY ALFRED, LORD TENNYS