Sadness, Light, Joy

Let Me Be Sad

Now let me feel sad. Impulse, trained in gladness,
Do not try to whisk me away from grief

.........

Instead, let me grow rich with my sadness.

Let it mellow and strengthen my joy,

.........
Give tears permission to water the parch of loss.

Let its music ripple my spine.

Let me give ardent ear

To what was, to what never will be.
Grief, be my companion in joy.
...........

Like walking into a sea, only in depth can I float. 
Depth, too often feared for its power


To raise me footloose and struggling

Is all that can gentle me back to shore:

Safe, breathing in the cosmos of the sweet unknown
Full of the Light of having been sad.

—Emma Lou Thayne

BYU Studies Quarterly; Volume 53 no. 3 (2014)

*******************

I love this poem. I love the thoughts about grieving and coming through it with richness, light and joy. 

"Let me grow rich with my sadness"

"Let it mellow and strengthen my joy"

"Tears .. water the parch of loss"

Pay attention "what was, to what what never will be"

"Grief, my companion in joy"

"Full of the Light of having been sad."

Emma Lou Thayne, the poet, recently passed to the other side of the veil. She left behind a wonderful legacy.