Go and Don’t Look Back

I go down to the shore in the morning
and depending on the hour the waves
are rolling in or moving out,
and I say, oh, I am miserable,
what shall—
what should I do? And the sea says
in its lovely voice:
Excuse me, I have work to do.

Mary Oliver

I didn’t want to be miserable when he died. He didn’t want to go and leave me but his precious body said, enough! The Beloved called him back Home and I let go.

I went to the ocean and let the thunder of her waves deafen my cries. I screamed, cried, and begged for mercy. No, I didn’t want to be miserable. But I was. 

I was sad, scared, and miserably miserable. 

I promised him I would be okay otherwise he would have tried to hang on longer. But his body was hurting, and although he’d never use that word, he was miserable, trapped in a body that was dying. 

He patiently waited for me to say the words that would allow him to let go. Finally, that evening, I found the courage. My heart said it was time for us both to let go.

Go and Don’t Look Back

So, through uncontrollable tears that stung my face, I managed to say, in my small voice, “If you see the light, go and don’t look back. I’ll be okay—you know I will. It hurts, but you knew it would. It’s time for you to go home. I’ll join you when my time comes. So go and don’t look back.”

He never opened his eyes but as I said the words, he smiled and gently squeezed my hand. Then he took a breath, then another, and let go.

So much grief and fear and sadness. So much pain. So many details that needed attending to and me so exhausted. One tiny step at a time, I kept saying. I called the hospice nurse and my daughter and sat back in the chair next to his bed, my left hand still touching his right hand. 

Breathe, Lee, just keep breathing and do the next thing. 

Was I crying? I don’t remember. I just remember the nurse speaking to his doctor, who then spoke to me, “Sorry for your loss,” I think the doctor said, his voice kind and soft. 

It was official, he was pronounced two minutes after midnight. My daughter called the funeral home, “They are on their way,” she said through her tears. 

I leave the rest to her and the nurse and go up to my room and lay down and wait for them to take his body away, just his body, his Soul was there, lying on the bed with me. 

What Now?

For weeks, I went to the beach every day and cried, ranted, and tossed my misery into the waves. My teacher, Neelam, said, “ Don’t fight the misery, just toss it into the waves. I promise one day you will notice that you can more easily be with the pain. That’s when you’ll know the misery is dissolving.”

And dissolve it did. How long did it take? I really can’t say. I just know I kept putting one foot in front of the other, day in and day out. I kept doing my work by inviting my pain in for tea, asking, “What now?” I just kept feeling the discomfort and staying present with it all. 

Writing and journaling helped, and of course meditation and breathwork. What was originally one tiny baby-step-at-a-time morphed into one day at a time, then receded to only when the pain would arise. 

Spaciousness replaced hurt. Joy arose in moments when Dragonfly or Mourning Dove or Dolphin would visit, reminding me of the astounding beauty of simply doing my work.

There is so much magnificence near the ocean
Waves are coming in, waves are coming in …

Peter Makena