Countdown 60:

Yesterday I wrote about how our words matter. Tonight I’d like to share something I wrote for a church service several years, which also speaks about the power of words and all the passages that inspired me.

Today’s readings by Mary Oliver and Martin Luther King are both personal reflections on death. I was not yet aware of that on Friday when I was attending a funeral. The mother of a close college friend had died gently at age 95 and her family was at peace with her passing; it would be a celebration of a good life, well-lived. 

Before the funeral began I was talking with another college friend. She was telling me about a book she was reading about Margaret Fuller in preparation for a Road Scholar trip this spring with a focus on the Transcendentalists, including a visit to Walden Pond. She had really been enjoying their essays and poetry. 

With that nudge I asked her if she had ever read the poetry of Mary Oliver, who had passed away just the day before at age 83. Since she hadn’t, thanks to my trusty (but silenced)    i-Phone I shared some lines and quotes from her work, their beautiful strength resonating with my friend as well.

Just before we would get back on the road I checked my email to see if I had received today’s readings so I could practice during that ride and I felt a tingle of awe that the words I’d just been sharing with a friend would be shared again today with you. 

I light the chalice today for the wonder of words that connect us; in gratitude for the wisdom of those behind the words and in hope that our live’s purpose will be supported and strengthened by the messages we hear today.

FIRST READING 

from Mary Oliver

When death comes

like the hungry bear in autumn;

when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse

to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;

when death comes

like the measle-pox

when death comes

like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,

I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:

what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?

And therefore I look upon everything

as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,

and I look upon time as no more than an idea,

and I consider eternity as another possibility,

and I think of each life as a flower, as common

as a field daisy, and as singular,

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth,

tending, as all music does, toward silence,

and each body a lion of courage, and something

precious to the earth.

When it's over, I want to say all my life

I was a bride married to amazement.

I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it's over, I don't want to wonder

if I have made of my life something particular, and real.

I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,

or full of argument.

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world

SECOND READING 

from Martin Luther King, from his final sermon 

If any of you are around when I have to meet my day, I don’t want a long funeral. And if you get somebody to deliver the eulogy, tell them not to talk too long. Tell them not to mention that I have a Nobel Peace Prize— that isn’t important. Tell them not to mention where I went to school.

I’d like somebody to mention that day that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to give his life serving others.

I’d like for somebody to say that day that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to love somebody.

I want you to say that day that I tried to be right on the war question.

I want you to be able to say that day that I did try to feed the hungry.

And I want you to be able to say that day that I did try in my life to clothe those who were naked.

I want you to say on that day that I did try in my life to visit those who were in prison.

I want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity.

Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace. I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will not matter. I won’t have any money to leave behind. I won’t have the fine and luxurious things of life to leave behind. But I just want to leave a committed life behind. And that’s all I want to say.q