IN MEMORIAM: REFLECTIONS ON GRIEF AND THANKSGIVING

A Dramatic Collage For Four Actors

By Charles Deemer

 

In Memory of Dick and Ger

 

The author wishes to thank the many members of this congregation who opened up their hearts and shared their stories.

 

 

 

 

*** OPENING MUSIC: “Go Down Death” ***

 

 

ACTOR 1

What is there to say about grief?  Grief is a tidal wave that overtakes you, smashes down upon you with unimaginable force, sweeps you up into its darkness, where you tumble and crash against unidentifiable surfaces, only to be thrown out on an unknown beach, bruised, reshaped. 

 

ACTOR 2

Grief means not being able to read more than two sentences at a time. It is walking into rooms with intention that suddenly vanishes. 

 

ACTOR 3

Grief is three-o'clock-in-the-morning sweats that won't stop. It is dreadful Sundays, and Mondays that are no better. It makes you look for a face in a crowd, knowing full well the face you want cannot be found.  

 

ACTOR 4

In other cultures, it is not uncommon for a widow to mutilate herself after her husband’s death. This would only make sense to those who have been there. She feels such torturous pain on the outside that relief seems only to be found in counter-pain.

 

ACTOR 3

We who grieve are exiled in our society. Exiled by the turning away of a face so they don’t have to witness our agony. Exiled by the silence left as friends and family drift away. Exiled by the lack of recognition of this universal experience.

 

ACTOR 1

Soon enough we sit in solitary confinement feeling as if no one else has ever felt what we feel. The irony is that what we are experiencing happens to most everyone. Reflections on Grief by Stephanie Ericsson.

 

 

 

 

ACTOR 4

“The irony is that what we are experiencing happens to most everyone.” Including to the members of this congregation.

 

ACTOR 2

Cheryl’s Story.

 

Five years ago this past October, my only child was diagnosed with acute leukemia. One month later, he died from treatment complications.  He was 29 and a happy, healthy, successful, recently married artist in his last year of graduate school. 

 

I can vouch that losing a child is one of the hardest things in the world for a parent.  Losing my only child meant that everything about my world shifted drastically.  All that I visualized of what the rest of my life would be like changed.  I'm doing fine but it's a lot harder than I thought to be okay in the world without him here too. 

 

A few months after his death a friend suggested that I write poetry to help me through the grief.

 

ACTOR 3

“Yes” by Cheryl Macy

 

I asked if your spirit was okay

You said yes

It’s just your body acting up

You said yes

Then you left your body

Now it’s my spirit that is okay

It’s just my heart that is acting up

 

ACTOR 2

Poetry proved to be a way I could document the events and my feelings in an economical way.  I wrote a lot of poems during that first year.  It gave me something to do with the grief when it felt overwhelming. 

 

ACTOR 1

“Finality” by Cheryl Macy

 

I was sent home

from work again today—

thoughts of you

had crowded out all others

even the activity of work

could not keep the mind from reminding me

that you are gone

forever.

In this world of impermanence

where change is the rule

death seems so final,

so permanent and unchangeable.

It is hard to accept

that it is just another

moment of life.

 

ACTOR 4

“How are you?” is the question a grieving person hates more than any other question. Ask it and we’ll hate you. Don't ask and we'll hate you. Those around us care, but they are caught between sympathy and the rude awakening that tragedy can happen very close to home.  "How are you?" becomes merely a greeting for most, not a genuine inquiry. Sometimes we'll be able to resist the temptation to tell them the truth, and simply answer back "I'm fine," as if it were simply a wave hello. Other times, we won't be so strong. 

 

ACTOR 2

The most insidious side of the language of grief  is the lack of words that give weight to the experience. Those who choose to give us condolences seldom stop to recognize the power of the awakening we are forced into. Instead they pity us, safely distanced from the heat of our experience. Unfortunately, few are willing to walk into the darkness before it’s their time. If we try to tell others what it’s like, we’re stuck with words that don't even come close.

 

ACTOR 3

Lonely is such a word, as in “I am lonely now.” "Ah," they can say, "I know what that feels like.” But they don’t know this caliber of loneliness. It’s like calling a hurricane a mere storm. There is just enough truth to cause a serious misunderstanding. Stephanie Ericsson 

 

ACTOR 1

Helen’s story.

 

My dad died of cancer in 1970.  I was 19, my sister was 17 and my brother was 15. 

 

I was living away at college and knew that my dad hadn’t been well and had had surgery for a prostrate problem.  The doctor said that he was fine and could go back to work 6 wks after surgery.  I believe the doctor knew that my dad only had a few weeks to live and thought he was giving him time to just be normal. 

 

So my dad returned to work.  He was in such strong denial that we couldn’t see how sick he still was.  A few days later he was readmitted to the hospital when he lost the use of his legs. 

 

My mom never called me.  He’d sent her home from the hospital along with my younger siblings because he knew he’d be better in the morning.  He died alone the first night he was back in the hospital. 

 

Our next door neighbor drove 5 hrs to my college to get me.  I hit him when he told me that my father was dead.

 

My mom never forgave herself for leaving that night.  In many ways we lost both our parents.  My mom had an emotional breakdown and has never truly recovered.  My dad was with strangers when he died and we never got to say goodbye. This is a sadness that we’ve all carried with us for over 30 years.

 

ACTOR 2

We live in a culture which does not permit us to acknowledge grief. We live in a culture which does not permit us to acknowledge that grieving requires time and attention. When our personal universes are shattered, it requires patience and care to reconstruct them because that piece we called "mother" or "father" is no longer there. The death of a parent requires us to ask yet again: Who am I? Who we are while our parents live is not, cannot be, who we are once they are dead. Julius Lester.

 

ACTOR 4

Tricia’s Story.

 

My mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer in early September, three months before Oregon voted on physician assisted suicide. She was a Republican, conservative, “lady in pearls” type who insisted she be wheeled to the voting polls to cast her vote in favor of it. She had to wear a house robe because by November her belly was too bloated for other clothes. 
 
A week or so after the election, I placed the first squeezer full of morphine in her mouth. She reminded me that she might have more to say about physician assisted suicide. In December I went with her to see her doctor.  She asked him about her rights under this new law.  I wasn’t sure why she didn’t understand that the courts were all tied up about it. Physician assisted suicide wasn’t available to her. She was deeply, deeply disturbed. I contacted the ACLU to see if she had standing to pursue a legal remedy. Then she slipped into a coma and ten days later she died. 
 
We opened the window although it was January because a person who’d been caring for her said it was important to let the spirit be free to move, that if it were confined in a closed-up room, it might do mischief. 
 
I miss my mother. I wear her pearls.
 

ACTOR 2

“Safety “ by Grace Kuhns
 
I knew you
entire:  
from your fine,
passing-for-blond hair 
to your wide, sturdy feet
too ticklish for touch.
I knew  
your translucent skin,
freckled back 
and, in summer
nutmeg-sprinkled knees.
I knew  
the whole coastline of your body
every rise and inlet, I had
curved around you
every night in sleep, memorized
the tides of your breath. 
How could I not know?
Something cold was spawning
in your cells
as we slept. 
 
 
*** MUSIC: Morris’ Song About His Mother ***
 
 
ACTOR 2

“Laying Out Clothes” by Leana McClellan

 

There is no one else upstairs. All are in the living room talking, eating, whispering, weeping. I am here to choose the clothing my father is to be buried in. "Only eighteen and already you’re so good at this kind of thing." my aunts agreed. They sent me up to do the job.

 

I open the top drawer of his hi-boy dresser, violating his privacy, flash a look at the door. Socks rolled tightly, handkerchiefs ironed, folded in a perfect pile, an unloaded handgun that my brother and I furtively fondled as children.

 

An ancient gift box lid holds things one can’t quite throw away, extra buttons, one cuff link, a gimp key chain made at camp, a penny flattened by a trolley car, old keys. The drawer smells like him, menthol and clean laundry. I rest my face on the stack of handkerchiefs, close my eyes, inhale. I think, "I’ve got to tell Dad about the enormity of this in my life."

 

I cull the black socks for holes, open packages of under shirts and boxer shorts that were bought ahead on sale. "Don’t forget fresh underwear," the funeral director had said.

 

In his closet, I close the door, seal myself in stillness, sound deadened by pockets, lapels, woolens and robes. My eyes graze the familiar interior. I have read, played, peeked at birthday presents here.

 

Though no one will see my Dad but the undertaker, I assemble his finest: a gray wool suit, silky white shirt still wrapped from the cleaner, glossy black dress shoes. I pick his favorite necktie, maroon and gray paisley, too narrow to be stylish, stained from a recent meal. A week ago I prodded him to throw it out.

 

Now I smooth out the wrinkles and gingerly place it on top of the stack -- as though it had life.

 

ACTOR 1

'Tm not going to try to comfort you," Spangler said. "I know I couldn't. But try to remember that a good man can never die. You will see him many times. You will see him in the streets. You will see him in the houses, in all the places of the town. In the vineyards and orchards, in the rivers and clouds, in all the things here that make this a world for us to live in. You will feel him in all things that are here out of love, and all the things that are abundant, all the things that grow. The person of a man may leave or be taken away but the best part of a good man stays. It stays forever. Love is immortal and makes all things immortal. But hate dies every minute."  William Saroyan, The Human Comedy.

 

ACTOR 3

Dana Jean’s Story.

 

My father and I were skiing buddies. We were heading up to Mt Hood to go night skiing for the very first time – I was so excited.  I was a 15 year old with a learner's permit. 

 

My last memory of that day is driving out of the driveway.

 

I woke up 2 weeks later in the hospital.  There had been an accident. My father was dead.  Everything was completely surreal. 

                       

My family was very shut down and never talked about what happened.  I never knew until 15 years later where his ashes were, or the circumstances of the accident. 

 

My mother, who has chronic mental illness, was a mess. My sister was off to college, and I became the "parent" of the family by default.

 

For years I felt like I was crazy. I didn't fit in at all with my friends in high school. I no longer cared about the things that high school girls normally care about -- boys, clothes, makeup. For about a year after the accident, I didn’t speak to anyone except when absolutely necessary to get through school. 

 

I dropped down to 92 pounds. My mom took me to doctors, and they all said I was "fine".  Over the years I became an alcoholic.

 

In 1985, I moved back to Portland from back east and decided to start working on this issue. I got the police report and The Oregonian story about the accident. I learned that it was I who had been behind the wheel at the time.  

 

I always sensed there was something I didn't know that others knew. No wonder I felt crazy.

 

I began dealing with the grief in therapy.  I still feel the impact of that profound loss in my life – I feel it on a daily basis.  To this day, my mother and I have never had a "real" conversation about what had happened on that day 33 years ago.

 

ACTOR 1

“Requiem” by Wendell Berry

 

We will see no more 

the mown grass fallen behind him 

on the still ridges before night, 

or hear him laughing in the crop rows, 

or know the order of his delight. 

 

Though the green fields are my delight, 

elegy is my fate. I have come to be 

survivor of many and of much 

that I love, that I won't live to see 

come again into this world. 

 

Things that mattered to me once 

won't matter any more, 

for I have left the safe shore 

where magnificence of art 

could suffice my heart. 

 
 
*** MUSIC: “Weep No More” ***
 
 

ACTOR 3

Grief remains one of the few things that has the power to silence us. It is a whisper in the world and a clamor within. More than sex, more than faith, even more than its usher, death, grief is unspoken, publicly ignored except for those moments at the funeral that are over too quickly, or the conversations among the cognoscenti, those of us who recognize in one another a kindred chasm deep in the center of who we are. Maybe we do not speak of it because death will mark all of us sooner or later. Or maybe it is unspoken because grief is only the first part of it. Anna Quindlen.

 

ACTOR 4

As Janis Joplin sang in her song: "Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose." There is a lighter side to loss. Ironically, sometimes losing everything grants us our spiritual freedom. Like the barefoot Buddha, who needs only to beg for food and a place to sleep for the night, we have been freed of the weight of worldly possessions. The Buddha doesn't worry about making the car payment. He doesn't chew his nails over leaky roofs. He doesn't even take out the garbage. Stephanie Ericsson.

 

ACTOR 2

Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh. George Bernard Shaw.

 

ACTOR 3

Death should not be seen as the end but as a very effective way to cut down expenses. Woody Allen.

 

ACTOR 4

Between grief and nothing I will take grief. William Faulkner.

 
ACTOR 1
Look around you. Every face is a mask hiding loss, hiding grief. There are so many stories …
 
(Actors 2, 3 and 4 all speak in unison, a cacophony of grief: )
 
ACTOR 2
Our son Matt died in May 98 in a bicycle-truck accident here in Portland near the Hawthorne business district.  Kurt my husband, and I have talked about our grief and loss and honor Matt's memory by hosting his friends at a birthday gathering every August. There is a memorial life house on the corner of SE 37th and Taylor (between Hawthorn and Belmont) created by community folks. Our son was a 27 year old single guy. One of his attributes was in strong friendships.
Our son was a 27 year old single guy.  One of his attributes was in strong friendships.  He kept friends and was often the link in getting friends together.  
Our son was a 27 year old single guy.  One of his attributes was in strong friendships.  He kept friends and was often the link in getting friends together.  
Our son was a 27 year old single guy.  One of his attributes was in strong friendships.  He kept friends and was often the link in getting friends together.  Our son was a 27 year old single guy.  One of his attributes was in strong friendships.  He kept friends and was often the link in getting friends together.  Our son was a 27 year old single guy.  One of his attributes was in strong friendships.  He kept friends and was often the link in getting friends together.  
 
Prior to that I had been a volunteer with hospice in eastern Washington.  After Matt's death, I was humbled to think about what I didn't know.  ACTOR 3

Losing the baby -- an amazingly painful and rich time.  Tommy was my second child.  He was to be born when my daughter, Emily, was two and a half.  Unlike most of my friends, I had had no trouble conceiving Emily had had an easy pregnancy until week 30 when I started contracting 10 weeks early. They treated me with a med that slowed the contractions but sped my heart up -- but who cared, Emily was healthy and full term. 

 
ACTOR 4
My husband and I received a call from our son on October 12, 1986.  I remember the date so well because we arrived home minutes before after celebrating my mother’s eightieth birthday in St. Helens.  During that time, I had a conversation with my cousin Coramae and my sister Deena about their sons’ involvement in using drugs, and their gnawing concern over their behavior.  I had brushed over that conversation, certain my son would do okay, despite the smell of marijuana that permeated the outside of the house…
 
ACTOR 1
(sudden interruption, as Swami Kree)
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
Everything is foolishness!
Everything is pride!
Everything is ego!
Everything is blindness!
The eyes do not see!
The ears do not hear!
The nose does not smell!
The tongue does not taste!
The mouth only is alive with speaking!
Everything is speaking, speaking, speaking!
Speaking and pride and ego and foolishness!
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
(Pause.)
I feel like the center of attention!
 
ACTOR 3
The sensibilities of western culture are not the only sensibilities in the world, and others look at grief very differently than we do. In Charles Deemer’s play “Christmas at the Juniper Tavern,” an American woman in grief confronts an Eastern guru, a character Deemer based on an historic figure, an 8th century Zen clown named Teng Yin-feng. The woman has lost her daughter, first to the swami’s quote cult unquote and later to death when the young woman dies in an auto accident in India. She blames the swami for her daughter’s death. 
 
ACTOR 1 (as swami)
You feel so much anger. 
 
ACTOR 2 (as woman)
Of course I’m angry – I lost my daughter to your lies.
 
ACTOR 1
You think you feel anger for me because your daughter is gone. But no one is gone. The form of life changes only – the reality is immortal.
 
ACTOR 2
Your mystical mumbo jumbo won’t work with me. Cindy is dead.
 
ACTOR 1
Cindy’s karma took her on many journeys, as it continues to do now and in the future, and in one of those journeys you were blessed to play the role of her mother. You should celebrate your good fortune, not grieve for what was inevitable.
 
ACTOR 2
Don’t mock my grief. If you hadn’t brainwashed my daughter into joining that cult of yours, she’d be alive today.
 
ACTOR 1
You don’t feel grief for Cindy. You are fooling yourself to think that.
 
ACTOR 2
Cindy is dead! Of course I feel grief.
 
 
 
ACTOR 1
The grief you feel is for yourself. And why should you grieve for yourself? Because you didn’t love your daughter fully when it was possible to. If you’d loved her fully, unconditionally, during the accident of your role as mother, then all your energies would’ve been dissipated in that great total love.
 
ACTOR 3
The swami’s argument sounds strange to western ears. If you believe in reincarnation, then death isn’t an ending – it’s a change of address. Hence the swami’s contention, “You should celebrate your good fortune, not grieve for what was inevitable.” Indeed, the way different cultures deal with grief is a complex and fascinating subject – but a subject for another time. Suffice it to say that grief is a real emotion in most, perhaps all, cultures, although some cultures ignore dealing with grief in any formal way and others institutionalize it, such as the classical Greeks using the Chorus in their cosmic Tragedies to give grief an epistemological function and meaning. 
 
ACTOR 2
In visions of the night, like dropping rain,
Descend the many memories of pain
Before the spirit’s sight: through tears and dole
Comes wisdom o’er the unwilling soul—
A boon of all Divinity…
…Wisdom is the child of pain
And born with many a tear.
Aeschylus.
 
ACTOR 3
In our culture, the challenge appears to be this – to actualize and experience the personal growth that can come from grief.
 
ACTOR 4
“Basic Emotions” by Cheryl Macy
 
Without you I am a different person.
I am a mother with no one to mother.
I will never be a grandmother.
The picture of my future has changed.
I listen to others talk about their kids
and  ache to be able to add something current.
Sometimes I go away and cry.
Other times I join their celebration.
A core of sadness tethers my happiness.
When I am doing fine one minute
and fall into a crevasse of sorrow the next,
I know that I am forever changed.
 
 
*** MUSIC: “Song at Dusk” ***

 

 

ACTOR 2

Cheryl’s Story, a postscript

 

I don't write much poetry any more -- probably because the focus that grief gives is not there --I'm back to being more scattered now. At this time, the hole that his death left is still there. I miss him but it isn't as raw.  I’ve learned a lot during these 5 years.  One thing I know for sure is that there’s no easy way to tell someone that my son died.  It is information that is hard for others to hear. 

 

Aaron was a wonderful and much loved person.  My house is full of his art.  They are reminders of how lucky I am to have had him in my life for as long as I did. 

 

ACTOR 3

And so we come together from the diversity of our grieving, 

to gather in the warmth of this community 

giving stubborn witness to our belief that 

in times of sadness, there is room for laughter. 

In times of darkness, there always will be light. 

May we hold fast to the conviction 

that what we do with our lives matters 

and that a caring world is possible after all. 

M. Maureen Killoran 

 

 

*** MUSIC: “Te Lucis” ***

 

 

ACTOR 1

Please join us in a closing responsive reading, a poem by Cheryl Macy, which is in your order of service.

Loving 

May I be at peace,

I sat with you through the night

May my heart remain open,

Helping you breathe and calm the fears

May I awaken to the light of my own true nature,

 

ACTOR 3

Sometimes you would repeat these words after me

May I be healed,

 

 

ACTOR 4

Two weeks later you died

May I be a source of healing for all beings. 

May I be at peace,

 

ACTOR 2

I have sweet memories of that night

May my heart remain open,

But I sit alone now

May I awaken to the light of my own true nature,

Struggling to get used to the world without you in it

May I be healed,

Yet willing to learn from your going

May I be a source of healing for all beings. 

 

 

***  CLOSING MUSIC: “Have Ye Not Heard?” ***