Paradox in Spring

Live Oak, April 15, 2007

Rev. Kathleen Ellis

“April is the cruellest (sic) month,” wrote poet T.S. Eliot to open his poem “The Waste Land.”

“April is the cruellest month, breeding

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing

Memory and desire, stirring

Dull roots with spring rain. . . .”

Last week I talked about Spring and the joy that comes when you look at new life bursting forth. Forget all that. Think about the shadow side, the sorrow and grief that sometimes give the lie to expectations for happiness in Spring. Easter! Resurrection! Bah, humbug!

More than one of us has experienced the loss of a loved one (or the anniversary of a death) in recent months. Even within the Live Oak community we have recently said goodbye to Dan Dreyer, Jim Terrell, and Mark Bishop. The sunshine and flowers outside serve as a stark reminder that they will not be here to appreciate this new growth. How can the sun continue to shine when a heart is broken? We know on one level that death is inevitable, and that knowledge shapes our lives. Most of the time we can accept death as an abstract principle--an impersonal fact of life.

My heart goes out to the mother whose son is on life support with no hope of survival. She can’t bear to allow him a natural death. He is already in limbo—unable to be fully alive, yet unable to die. His mother is still hoping to find a facility willing to provide his care. It’s much easier for us outsiders to see the futility of her quest. We can only imagine what she must be going through. But when death becomes personal through someone we know and love, emotions rise suddenly from the depths of our being. Grief, sorrow, guilt, and anger bump into one another in bewildering confusion. My sister was on a respirator several years ago. To stand beside her when it was removed was very personal and very painful to watch.

At a time like this, nothing can take the place of the outstretched hands of human sympathy and understanding, the spoken or the silent assurance given by family or friends. Howard Thurman writes from the perspective of such a friend:

I share with you the agony of your grief,

The anguish of your heart finds echo in my own.

I know I cannot enter all you feel

Nor bear with you the burden of your pain;

I can but offer what my love does give:

The strength of caring,

The warmth of one who seeks to understand

The silent storm-swept barrenness of so great a loss.

This I do in quiet ways,

That on your lonely path You may not walk alone.

Rituals are one way to help you feel a part of a community and that you will be okay.

It is ironic that several weeks after I chose this topic, my cousin Martin died suddenly. Though his yard is already in full bloom, his opportunity to get out in the woodlands, hills, rivers, and bayous where he loved to wander was cut short in the very season of wandering. He cultivated award-winning roses, and introduced me to air plants and orchids.

Because he did such a variety of things in his life, there was a long obituary for the paper and for the order of service at his memorial service. There was plenty of material for a eulogy—perhaps too much, because it was impossible to mention everything. That was the public story.

Behind the scenes was the private story. One was the fact that his brother chose not to help plan the service or to speak during the service because the two of them had been estranged for a number of months. Another was a dispute among the siblings about where their brother with Down syndrome would live now that Martin, his primary caretaker, has died. On the surface, everything looked normal.

Paradox is a condition of life. It’s an apparently true statement that seems to lead to a contradiction or to circumstances that defy intuition. We allude to it in the form of proverbs like these: “Between a rock and a hard place”; “Damned if you do, damned if you don’t”; “A no-win situation”; “Every cloud has a silver lining.”

Consider these contradictions: In the southern hemisphere, Easter comes at harvest time, a precursor to the onset of winter. Cute fawns become deer eating gardens. Colorful blue jays eat seeds and young sprouts that are just coming up in your gardens. For every resurrection there is a death. Spring and summer are the seasons for job hopping, changing schools, moving to new cities and communities, a feeling of restlessness and wanting something new and different.

Sometimes people come to me with their life struggles and try to figure out how to muddle through. Not infrequently, they will downplay their problems. They know others have more challenging troubles and it doesn’t seem right to complain. But if you’re feeling bad, you have a right to your pain. There will always be someone who suffers more, and there will always be someone whose happiness is greater than your own.

When the time is right, your cup will begin to fill again. When it fills to the brim you’ll be able to reach out to someone who needs you just a little bit more. That’s how we make the most of life, through the experience of loss and the ability to give to someone else in need.

You may know this story:

“At the time of the Buddha, a young woman named Kisa Gotami experienced a series of tragedies, losing her husband, and then another close family member, and then her only son. Undone by grief, she carried the body of her dead child through the village, asking for help; no one could help. But someone brought her to the Buddha, who was teaching in a nearby forest grove.

“’Great master, please bring my boy back to life.’ The Buddha replied that he would, if she would return to the village and bring back a handful of mustard seed—the most common Indian spice. ‘From this,’ he said, ‘I will fashion a medicine. There is one thing more, though,’ he added. ‘The mustard seed must come from a home where no one has died, where no one has lost a child or parent, a spouse or a friend.’

“Kisa Gotami ran to the village and began knocking on doors, begging for mustard seed. Seeing her grief, people were only too happy to help, until they heard the sad condition. ‘Has anyone in this home died?’ she asked. Over and over again, sadly, they replied, ‘Yes.’ From house to house she went, seeking a household that had not known death. There was not one.

“Finally, Kisa Gotami sat down in her great sorrow, and realized that all who are born will also die. She returned to the Buddha, who helped her to bury her son.

“It is said that Kisa Gotami became a wise woman and a great teacher, a great and compassionate teacher.”

“April is the cruellest (sic) month,” when death has stalked our loved ones and sunshine contrasts so cruelly with the sorrow we feel. It is our lot in life, that every facet has its opposite. William Blake was right: “Joy and woe are woven fine, A clothing for the soul divine. Under every grief and pine Runs a joy with silken twine.”

Cousin Martin missed out on this April, but he surely enjoyed dozens of other Aprils. Rather than dwelling on the fact that he is gone, I will remember the life he shared. The sun will continue to shine somewhere in the world to dry up the mud in this messy life. Visualize E.E. Cummings: [“inJust-Spring”]

“in Just- spring when the world is mud- luscious the little lame balloonman

whistles far and wee

and eddieandbill come running from marbles and piracies and it's spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer old balloonman whistles far and wee and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's spring and the

goat-footed

balloonMan whistles far and wee”

Have you been mired in muddy paradox this spring? Listen for the whistle of the little balloon man. He’s calling us out to play. Will you come with me?

Amen