On the 6th November last, the shared anniversary of my late husband’s passing and my late dad’s birthday, I bought a bunch of white roses in their memory. I took a single stem out to place on a memorial altar in my studio, my sacred space. It is now an incredible eleven weeks since that day and the rose is still in beautiful bloom. It’s one of those things that remind why I believe in magic.
I had written a piece that day too, which I had intended to share but somehow life got in the way, and it didn’t happen. The rose still standing so beautifully in its simple glass pot has prompted me to share it here.
Outside, the autumn wind is chilly, the sun is bright and beautiful, casting a smooth glow. The veil between the worlds is thin this time of year, allowing us to connect and commune with ancestors, loved ones and spirit.
Samhain has just passed. I have this morning packed up the ceramic skulls, skeletons, ravens, and pumpkins ready to be relegated to the loft for another year.
I don my coat and boots and head out on a personal walk of remembrance down to the Hythe. I have an innate need to be near water, it is where I find solace and connection, where my soul can find peace, where my poet’s heart pumps to its own rhythm. The river and the magnificent old sailing barges glint as though still summer. Merging myself into the place I love so much, I sit on the wooden benches snatching memories from the sky, walk some more by the low tide mud with its undulating patterns and watch the clouds lazily drifting by. Alone and thankful it is quiet, fellow wanderers are thin on the ground today, undisturbed spaces are plentiful.
I walk to the end of the water’s edge, then make my way up through the park to the cafe and the seating platform with views over the lake and the river beyond. I choose a table in a sunny spot with three chairs. I am expecting company, a reunion.
In my mind’s eye, my lovely dad sits to my left and my long-ago husband to my right. I feel them, can see them so clearly. My dad is wearing his winter cap, fidgeting, and insisting on paying just as I remember him always doing, my husband with his tousled dark hair and blue eyes watching me and wishing they served something other than coffee. I tell them I still miss them both, how this gathering on their shared anniversary means so much, even if two-thirds virtual to other eyes.
We talk about how my husband, who saw his daughter in the world for only a few months and never got to see her grow into the beautiful woman she is, now has two amazing grandchildren, themselves growing fast. My dad has more great grandchildren to add to his lot. We catch up on past years whilst relishing these sacred and special moments together, knowing they will soon pass.
I sit with them, sipping my latte. We are watching the seagulls in flight over the water, the bronzing of the park trees, the starlings seeking crumbs around the chair legs. I am taking in once again their eyes and smiles and little endearing behaviours. It is a brief encounter and tears slip silently down my cheeks as they gently leave but I feel held in the graceful warmth of their presence, too. A smile crosses my lips. I feel love riding on the wind.
I stop on the way home to buy white roses, to me a symbol of spirit love and peace. On my altar, I will place a white candle, beautiful, bronzed autumn leaves collected from the churchyard, and a carved wooden heart. Something physical to remind me of them.
Later, as I sit in front of it, I allow space for a new poem, but this piece arrives. I never force words onto the page but allow them to flow through me from my soul or from the source, or spirit. They are never wrong words, just maybe different from the expected. I honour them and their place on my page. It is a sacred act and a creative spiritual practice I have long embraced.
So, I share instead a poem already written in memory of a beautiful woman I once had the privilege to meet. I have read these words at many a ceremony of passing since. Today I dedicate it to the two lovely men I still love, miss, and remember every 6th November.
I Have Gone
I have blown away on a winters wind
A spent golden leaf lifted by nature’s breath
From my dance beneath the trees
To the gentle breeze of Summerland.
I have floated away on the oceans tide
A mermaid’s kiss lifted by ebb and flow
From the sands of my earthly time
To lie within the beauty of ancient grains.
I have risen in the brightness of a sacred fire
A glowing ember now quenched
And in the ashes of me I live and dance
To the beat of a heart in a candles flame.
I have seeded in the earth mother’s womb
A rare and beautiful flower grown and withered
Yet still in the darkness within her I grow
As the spirit of summer bright and strong.
Rhea Ruth Aitken
Deeply moving.
Deeply moving.