Read this at my funeral

Please, when I die,

Do not make a sad death notice

One that says,

“I was sorry to hear”

Or explains the tragedy that is not at all a tragedy.

Not from my perspective. 

When I die, let it be said that I transformed

From the density of my human form

To the silk feather that passes you in the hands of the wind

And the dandelion seed that follows 

As a reminder of new life. 

Let it be said that I go gently now

With the butterflies, whose wings are inexplicably delicate 

And the dolphins, who play in the fullness of joy 

When I die

Remember my old words as they were to you

But please, hear my voice in its new form, too–

in the hushed whispers of the blue gums

And the creaking of the willow.

Listen to my song in the waves

Cracking and ebbing with the foam…

Rumbling with the thunder.

I was not much of a singer before

But now, as you sit in front of the choir,

Hear my messages in their chorus

And feel my loveWhich is always in your heart. 

When I die, please do not miss me in my old

But seek me in my new

And when you look,

Find me waiting for you

Wind Song; War Song

Today as I, the wind, pass by the brown debris

Between the war-torn cobbled streets,

Next to where the pink-framed windows

With wild cyclamen used to be

I blow away ash from tattered cobweb remains

And hear the boy in the streets – with a cobble-marked ball

Whisper in his song to me;

The lost lyrics of a merman from behind a superhero cape

Of battered, stained sheets

Wish - is my song. At the wishful song’s wake

I stroke his face in a farther breeze from lands

Who also, could never be owned

In his beauty I see his mother

Who had shown him back then, to comb his hair

When combing your hair still seemed important.

Yes, it was she who had melted into him – in all those years – life lessons

Forewarning of cyclamen flames and cardamon explosions;

Poppy-seed scatterings and twisted olive tree funerals

Now it is only I,

Here to smooth the corners of his orphaned cloak

And whisper stories between this fallen kite and these brown ears

Praying for solace through my whistled song:

As if I can show you somehow my child,

“You belong; you belong”

I see you now in spring –

In the place where, for so many seasons

I laughed as you smiled to the winter stars

And sang to passing herons in the fall;

They would leave too.

I have passed through it all with you

On these cobbled streets with these crumbling cobbled walls

Remember how it used to be? Before the war.

I hear your wind song. Please hear mine now, too: You are not lost, my child, though you have lost all you know

You are found in the deep places

Only others don’t know.

You are not alone or lost. Nor are the herons.

Nor the wildflowers, or the sea. We are with you as you suffer.

Be brave if you can, promise me?

Artwork: Robbie Rorich

Kindness

There is too little understanding in this world of the strength behind kindness. To be gentle, empathetic, considerate, sensitive and compassionate is not a gift freely handed to the half-willing, nor is it the curse of the weak. True kindness requires thorny, gruelling questions of oneself and a complete dissection (and often undoing), of inner beliefs.

To know kindness in its most raw form, there must first be an uncomfortable 

unravelling of the mind’s deepest secrets and the honest forgiveness of oneself. Only then, can life – and the people we walk with in life – be loved with deep, beautiful, unrequited (but conditional), wonderful fullness. ------- If and when you hear somebody described as too kind, too gentle,  too soft or too sensitive, or when you yourself use those words with distaste to describe the ‘lacking of a backbone’ – know that the backbone of kindness is the most courageous of them all. Behind the face that smiles warmly is a body that has borne the weight of suffering and learnt to forgive. There, behind kindness is the bearer of loss who has learnt to keep giving. There, behind kindness is the traveller who has journeyed inward to find strength to love outward.

Notice when you stumble on the depths of compassion in the shallows of the world, beneath the chaos of a roaring life: in the waitress that is determined, and the till keeper that loves his job, the Uber driver that cares to ask about your family, the friend whose presence does not condone cruelty, the protector whose hand reaches out even when they themselves experience fear… When you see kindness – in its pure and gentle form – 

recognise the strength that is in your presence. Understand the brave choice that that kindness has required, and ask yourself,

 “What will be my choice?”

Artwork by a lion-spirit friend, Kerri Dunshea https://www.instagram.com/art.by.kez/?hl=en