#mourn

I drag the body out into the snowdrifts, as far away from our shack as I can muster. I put her in a thicket of trees, where the green seems to still have a voice in the branches, and try not to think about the beasts that’ll soon be gathering. There’s no way of burying her; the ground is a solid rock of ice beneath us. I kneel beside her and want desperately to weep. My throat tightens and my head aches. Everything hurts inside. But I have no way of releasing it. I’m locked up and hard as stone. “I’m sorry, Mamma,” I whisper to the shell in front of me. I take her hand. It could belong to a glass doll. There’s no life there anymore. So I gather rocks, one by one, and set them over her, trying my best to protect her from the birds, the beasts, keep her safe as much as I can now. I pile the dark stones gently on her stomach, her arms, and over her face, until she becomes one with the mountain. I stand and study my work, feeling like the rocks are on me instead, then I leave the body for the forest and ice. ↗

— Rachel A. Marks

#burry #cold #dead #dead-and-gone #death

The light in that room was a glow; I seem to remember the color green, or perhaps flowers. A pale green sheet covered his inert body but not his head, which lay (eyes closed, mouth set in a tense and terrible grimace) unmoving. Gianluca. Barely able to see, barely able to stand - my knees kept buckling – and breathing so quietly I thought that I, too, might die; that out of shock, I would just drift away, the shell of my body cracking open. No longer anchored by my brother’s love, I would be reabsorbed by sky. Gianluca. If there was never another sound in the world, I would understand – yes, that would be appropriate, it would be fitting. This was the antithesis of music, the antithesis of noise. My brother’s death seemed to demand silence of all the world. Gianluca. ↗

— Antonella Gambotto-Burke

#bereavement #depression #despair #gassing #grief

LAVINIA: He made me feel for the first time in my life that everything about love could be sweet and natural... I have a right to love! ↗

— Eugene O'Neill

#mourning-becomes-electra #life

I'm mourning with the rest of the world for the talented, gorgeous, funny, intelligent John Forsythe but my heart is broken for the loss of my dear, dear friend and neighbor. I will miss him terribly. ↗

— Cheryl Ladd

#dear #dear friend #friend #funny #gorgeous

I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness and the willingness to remain vulnerable. ↗

— Anne Morrow Lindbergh

#alone #believe #everyone #i #i do

What men prize most is a privilege, even if it be that of chief mourner at a funeral. ↗

— James Russell Lowell

#even #funeral #men #most #mourner

I'm more interested in the meaning of funerals and the mourning that people do. It's not a retail experience. It's an existential one. ↗

— Thomas Lynch

#experience #funerals #i #interested #meaning

I think you have to know how you feel when you're sad and it's healthy to mourn if a relationship ends. ↗

— Leighton Meester

#feel #healthy #how #i #i think

They which have no hope of a life to come, may extend their griefs for the loss of this, and equal the days of their mourning with the years of the life of man. ↗

— John Pearson

#days #equal #extend #griefs #hope

And yet, I suppose you mourn the loss or the death of what you thought your life was, even if you find your life is better after. You mourn the future that you thought you'd planned. ↗

— Lynn Redgrave

#better #death #even #find #future