An Obesity of Grief

From the Hidden Realms Tarot, the Five of Cups; from the Heart of Faerie, the Child:

When grief sits with you, its tropical heat

thickening the air, heavy as water

more fit for gills than lungs;

when grief weights you like your own flesh

only more of it, an obesity of grief,

you think, How can a body withstand this?

―Ellen Bass

Anyone who has ever deeply loved and lost anything or anyone knows the depths of despair. Grief engulfs us, like a huge wave; just when we think we can breathe again, another wave hits us. As poet Edward Hirsch described, grief is the task of Sisyphus. It is only when we stop focusing on the loss and also remember the good that we stop pushing the boulder. The Child comes to help us regain our sense of curiosity and wonder, to experience life without judgment. It is in realizing that this is a season of life, natural not personal, that we begin to heal. With compassion, we realize how many others have had their own boulders to deal with.

Then you hold life like a face

between your palms, a plain face,

no charming smile, no violet eyes,

and you say, yes, I will take you

I will love you, again.

―Ellen Bass