A Patient Willing Descent

In memory of Wendell Berry and all my lost loved ones

A loss of anything, a loved one, job, friend, home, although mostly inevitable and part of living in a transient world, is not what we naturally or willingly move toward. And even with all the signs and knowledge of the temporary nature of everything, we are surprised when life, relationships, and things don’t continue on the way we want.

I’m at the age in life where I have lost parents, siblings, and much more grievous, the person I was inside a family.  I grieve the loss of each loved one, but as time goes on, I grieve the loss of the loving family life I was part of for most my life. It is one of the harder diminishments of aging to watch much of what I was and had, shrink and descend.

All that I serve will die, all my delights,
the flesh kindled from my flesh, garden and field,
the silent lilies standing in the woods,
the woods, the hill, the whole earth, all
will burn in man’s evil, or dwindle
in its own age. Let the world bring on me
the sleep of darkness without stars, so I may know
my little light taken from me into the seed
of the beginning and the end, so I may bow
to mystery, and take my stand on the earth
like a tree in a field, passing without haste
or regret toward what will be, my life
a patient willing descent into the grass. 

–The wish to be Generous, Wendell Berry

Jane, my spiritual director, introduced me to the idea of “giving your death away,” from Ron Rolheiser, author and theologian who explains: “giving your death away” is the final, greatest spiritual task of human maturity, where we offer our dying (and diminishment) as a blessing rather than a burden to those we leave behind. Notes from Rolheiser, Giving Our Death to Our Loved Ones, 2001:

• If I live in bitterness and non-forgiveness, always full of accusation, then my death will pour those things out among my family and loved ones. Conversely, if I live in graciousness, in admiration, in forgiveness, and I am willing when it’s time to decrease so that others can increase…my death will mean new freedom and courage for those who knew me.

• As we age, the real task of life and love is to continually hand over, without bitterness, regret, or envy, all the things that were once so much our own (power, attention, popularity, usefulness, turf of every sort). Part of this, the hardest part of all, is forgiveness. To exit gracefully, we have to first forgive others, God, and ourselves for the fact that our lives didn’t turn out the way they might have. That’s easier said than done.

On a recent retreat to Lake Tahoe, I was entranced with the beauty of trees, from those that were thriving giants, to those wounded and scarred by weather and time. (My photo from an overlook at Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe) They became a backdrop for the deep prayers of my soul. Those prayers laid in the hollows of the trees, reminded me of author and naturalist, Belden C. Lane who says one of his best teachers of prayer has been a hundred-year-old tree he calls “grandfather.”  He writes of daily finding refuge and contemplation in the empty hollow of the tree. “Through the years the tree has taught me as much about praise as about grief. We share the anguish of loss as I lean into his rotting heartwood.” Belden C. Lane in The Great Conversation.

My own experience of praying with a tree or flower or bird, has helped me to see the beauty of God, to let go of the woundedness of loss, and to understand life as the Psalmist describes as a return to dust, days that are soon gone and fly away.  This knowledge becomes a prayer for wisdom and trust to be satisfied each morning I awake to the faithful love and graciousness of our God. (Psalm 90)

Most every day, I sit and pray with a tropical hibiscus plant, a gift from a dear friend when my younger sister took her own life.  The hibiscus is itself a model for living each day to the fullest with the bright colors of large showy flowers which end each day with gracious acceptance, folding up and letting go, dropping to the ground from which it began.

Lord I pray my life will be a patient willing descent. I pray to live as the hibiscus, relying on consistent sunlight, water, and nutrition, blooming with vibrant beauty each day. Help me to end each day with reflection and gratitude, taking note of where you, O God, were present . O Jesus, I ask for forgiveness for my humanity and your gracious restoration.  Receive all that I let go and drop off. O Spirit fill me with freedom to be reborn with fresh blooms in the dawn.

I take my stand on the earth like a tree in a field, passing without haste or regret toward what will be, my life a patient willing descent into the grass.