thakla

 Thakla
The grief of grief fills your body like buoyant molecules moving in slow motion through oil, touching every cell, informing every movement and every, single moment.
Grief is the forbidden feeling that now hides as heart palpitations and dizziness, the body preserving that unexplainable horror into an ongoing reality. Now she will never forget.
On particular days, at specific times, grief rises to the surface, coaxed by anniversaries and company.  She barely makes an appearance and then dives down into the body to dance in the innocent space of body, mind, and soul. But, the biology of grief and the distraction of pain is very accurate and precise. For this you have learned exactly what to do.

Today might be different. Today we might hold a bigger vision of this event by holding one hand up cupping grief and the other hand up cupping the ways in which his memory is preserved; two  sides of one coin, both sides of a slip of paper.

I remember spending a summer in Greece many years ago, in a small fishing village in the Peloponnese islands. I remember that so many older women were dressed in black, their dresses covering their arms and legs. I asked my travel friend, why? Why the black and why so many? He said all their husbands had died and their tradition was to theretofore dress in black, preserving the memory and making the public statement – I am a widow.  How many years ago did they die, I asked. Ah, at least thirty years for many of them!

Thirty years of wardrobe destiny - wearing black, preserving the memory of man.
You don’t wear black when a child dies. Do we even have a name for that?  According to Uri Granta, there is an Arabic word ‘thakla’ that refers to a bereaved mother. Perfect. And in the Tiwa Indian language the vowel sound ‘a’ means to wash and purify the mental and emotional body. Thakla has two a’s; an opportunity for double purification.  Perhaps we will chant this word together, you and I.

I will see you at 11:00 a.m. today. Today we will hold the dance of embodied grief and jump off a cliff together.  Remember that when we jump, the good news is that there is no ground to fall on. We are free to relax back and down into that dimensionless, emptiness that is vaster than even your grief, my friend. Vaster than even the collective grief of all the Mothers who have lost a child.

In the vastness of emptiness everything is held, but it is tempting to forget and ally with one possibility of so many.  Let us try again. Relaxing into emptiness is like being held by God, in the arms of the most loving Mother imaginable. She will take your grief and relieve your suffering as emptiness is bigger than all the suffering Mothers we know about and more.

This formless emptiness is allowing, true, and has no judgement about what your mind creates. None the less, if we hold this coin with skillful means, something else can happen!
The slightest sense of joy might emerge at the smallest of things or just because joy still exists beyond the observable push and pull of remembering. I am not asking you to jump up and down with a false joy, or even avoid grief, however I am pointing toward a deeper and wider possibility. You have already traveled so deep and wide with sorrow- it is honorable. And yet, perhaps today is the day that we will discover a fork in that river.  From the river of tears and endless fears to the river of empty joy providing a larger scenery with a vaster view; body relaxing, cells opening, heart renewed. And if none of this happens, I am still here empty of your agenda, ready for your ride, honored to experience thakla, and grateful to be by your side, over and over again.