25 October 2022 – Today I learned:
of the existence of this poem, When Great Trees Fall, by Maya Angelou. Actually, yesterday I heard this poem read by the grieving daughter of a good friend of ours who died last Sunday. Her memorial service yesterday morning began with some piano jazz and then this whopper.
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.
It feels so appropriate for Mary Lou, whose graceful, persistent presence made and makes us better people and whose death has changed the air in which we breathe.
Featured image: beloved blooming American yellowwood tree (Cladrastis kentukea) in our friends’ backyard, June 2020. It’s hardy in our zone (4) but very rare to see here.
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