"Our" Lady of Sorrows

                This was not the first time she had witnessed this, nor would it be her last; yet something moved within her, profoundly. True, so much time had passed between where she was now, and where she had been, that the pain had become a dull ache, but still she remembered. There had been so much blood that she had at first believed that it could not all have belonged to him, but as the grim reality of the situation donned on her, as she held her son’s pale, still cooling hand, she broke.

              
 She screamed.
              
                Everything had stopped and what was going on around her no longer mattered. She did not care that her husband was standing by her side, that her in-laws were but a few feet away or that her friends had gathered around her. There was only the pain, there was only her voice. Her cry split the very air through which it moved; a resonant wail that echoed into the valley floor, spread across the lake and into the sky above. The sound was suffocating, her moan became a roar.
                           
            She screamed.
               
Her body began to revolt against her, her eyes streamed as though her being had been up to this point, nothing but tears. Her throat burned, as if her lungs had become great furnaces and each piercing wail that escape her lips was a dagger, carving away as they passed. Her legs had long ago given out, and she felt as if she were rooted to the earth upon which her crumpled body had fallen in despair. Her fists had clenched to tightly that her nails had dug deep, torn through the worn flesh and her hands streamed nearly as much as her eyes.
                                  
                      She screamed.

                Men, women and children fell dead at the sound, cattle miscarried and many of the horses bolted from their camp in sheer terror at this otherworldy wailing, tumbling into the lake, mad with fear. The skies began to grow dark, the earth seemed to be slowly undulating under foot and the lake seemed to be growing more turbulent, frothing and bubbling in unison with this stricken mother. Those around her, who had been struck dumb by her cry, took notice and realized that if something was not done they would all perish.

                                        She screamed.

                He would never again speak to her, never again laugh or cry, never again be held in her embrace. Her tall, handsome and strong son had been laid low, felled in the prime of his youth; stolen from her. Stolen from her by whom she knew not. Stolen from her for no reason she could then understand. Stolen so recently that she could still hear his laughter echoing in her ears. Now, her once proud son, her most precious possession, was gone.
                                                             
                                                   She screamed.

                They looked around at one another, still paralyzed by the sheer force of her wail. The sky had gone from a deep black to a burning red. The sun appeared a sickly, misshapen disc and its warmth now seemed a mere memory. Her tears and her blood had begun to mingle with the rising waters of the lake, which was steadily approaching in small waves. They realized that if something were not done, if this uncanny shrieking was not stopped, they would all of them be no better off than her poor son. The fear of their impending doom spurred a fire in all of them, and the fetters which had frozen them in place shattered.
                                                                       
                                                                    She screamed.

                The pain was there, and her head was swimming from her strain, but it was staring to fade. Her voice began to crack, her lungs that had burned like a need fire was now burning out. Her body ached and her bosom heaved, the pain was being dowsed with the loss of sensation; numbness began to creep along her limbs. But she would not be stymied, and as her own guilt for failing to protect him welled within her chest, the pain redoubled and the flames roared back to life.
                                                                               
                                                                                 She screamed.

                They sprang upon her, shook her, struck her, cried out to her, only to be drowned out by her lamentations. Nothing they did was of any avail; no shouts could quiet her, no arms could hold her, not twenty of their strongest could move her. Her grief was weighing her down, as if she shared the same roots as the mountains. Realizing that no force could stop her, that no reason would reach her, they broke and fled for their lives.
                                                                                               She screamed.

Alone she was left, with no company but her poor, dead son, his head resting on her lap. The streams that had issued forth from her eyes had washed away the ichor that had caked his clothing, discoloured his gleaming hands and obscured his shining face. His wound, that had streamed with the same fury as his mothers tears, was so small it was hard to believe that it such a thing had killed her hale, boastful, splendid son. But he was still, he was quiet as no boy should be, and with her son in her arms, she finally relented.
                                                                                                                    She screamed.

Then all went dark, all sensation ceased and all that came after was quiet and silence. Her body was spent, her very soul a hairs breadth away from joining with that of her son, she collapsed. She dreamed of him then; of her bright, happy, joyous boy. She watched him leaping through the air as he dashed through the fields, climbing over hill and rock, and diving into the deepest of pools, a bundle of lightning in boys’ clothes. Then he stopped, he aged suddenly into a fine, handsome young man and he turned to look at her; he said something her ears did not hear and with a final wave of his hand, stepped through a sudden mist, and was gone.

After that, she remembered very little until long after he had been laid to rest. The pain she felt on that first, terrible day had eventually subsided. The pain became numbness, numbness became sadness, sadness became a deep grief, grief that gripped her heart as she had gripped the earth. Yet, little by little, the grip loosened on her heart. Light slowly flittered its way back into her life and while she would not, could not ever truly be whole again, she discovered that joy had stealthily creeped back into her life.

This was all so long ago, ages it seemed now. Much had happened before, and much had happened still after. Yet her she was again, surrounded by those with whom she shared a terrible kinship, for they like her, had also known the pain of death and loss. Yet, in the end, this made her stronger; strong enough even that she could now be a source of strength for those who needed her. For those to whom it seems as if time has stopped and life itself had come to an end, who ask how this could have happened and how do I go on?

For all of us who mourn, for all of us who grieve, for all who question why; she is there. She offers no easy answers, no platitudes, no quick fix. She cannot turn back the capricious nature of fortune, nor take away the pain of loss; she had no power over those claimed by death. Yet tall she stands, strong she remains, and a balm for the soul is her gift. She, above all others, understands the sorrow, knows full well the feeling and remembers the hurt.

In her compassion, may we find consolation.
In her wisdom, may we find meaning.
In her courage, may we find our own.

-Gorm

A Rabbit's Prayer (or the art of Elegy)

"My heart has joined the thousand, for my friend stopped running today" - Richard Adams

Simple yet profound, and probably my favourite "prayer" from any work of fiction; I also don't seem to be alone, a quick Google returns around 173 million hits. For those unfamiliar with the novel the quote comes from, Watership Down, which contains some marvelous mythology and folklore, some explanation may be required. I believe the prayer is straightforward, with the exception of "the thousand". The progenitor of all rabbits, according to their own folklore, is named El-ahrairah, whose name translates to "Prince with a thousand enemies". He garnered this name by ignoring his god's (Frith) warning that his children were multiplying too fast, devastating the land and the other creatures. El-ahrirah ignored Frith, and so as punishment, Frith endowed the other creatures with a ravenous hunger for the children of El-ahrirah. "The thousand" then, refers to all of the creatures in the world who seek to do harm to the rabbits. In the context of the prayer, then, the rabbits essentially "die" a little bit at the loss of their friend; the rabbits are heart broken. The simple eloquence of equating death with the image of a still lying rabbit (the antithesis of what a rabbit ought to do, according to their own folklore), is very powerful, even profound. The very palpable loss is expressed in terms even a child could understand, but is in no way talking down to the reader, or diminishing the grief felt by the characters.

El-hrairah, Prince of the Rabbits

Structurally, the prayer is very personal, "My Heart... My Friend", yet can be spoken by a larger group; again, as rabbits are by their nature, social animals. The established folklore surrounding "the thousand" is understood, but there is no mention of any sort of "persistence of personality" found within the prayer. What remains is a strong sense of loss, very appropriate for a lamentation or elegy. Perhaps it is this, that the sense of loss is so central to the prayer that it does remind me of many examples of "Celtic" elegiac poetry, and "Celtic" death narratives (or generally oitte). These texts are, again generally, not happy affairs (very much at odds with the frivolity associated with the tradition of wakes). There is no joy or happiness in them, jut the ever present companionship of grief. Consider the following poem "The Unquiet Grave":

"I am stretched on your grave, and you'll find me there always; if I had the bounty of your arms I should never leave you. Little apple, my beloved, it is time for me to lie with you; there is the cold smell of the clay on me, the tan of the sun and the wind.

 There's a lock on my heart, which is filled with love for you, and melancholy beneath it as black as the sloes. If anything happens to me, and death overthrows me, I shall become a fairy wind-gust down on the meadows before you

When my family thinks I am in my bed, it is on your grave I am stretched from night till morning, telling my distress and lamenting bitterly for my quiet lovely girl who was betrothed to me as a child.

Do you remember the night when you and I were under the blackthorn tree, and the night freezing? A hundred praises to Jesus hat we did nothing harmful, and that your crown of maidenhood is a tree of light before you!

The priests and the monks every day are angry with me for being in love with you, young girl, when you are dead. I would be a shelter from the wind for you and protection from the rain for you; and oh, keen sorrow to my heart that you are under the earth!" - Traditional Irish folk-song. 260-1

This is downright depressing; the grief and despair leaps off the page. There are countless examples, but some from the myths. Brigid, upon learning that her son Rudhan had been killed, screams. A primal, visceral reaction to her loss (especially that of her child), the consequence of which was the establishment of the caoineadh or keening, as a practice which would be continued in Ireland until the early 20th century*. Personal experience, leads me to believe that while not keening per se, that screaming (especially from females) is still rather common when confronted with the loss of a loved one, across a considerably diverse swath of cultures. There is a very moving text in which Emer laments for Cúchulain upon learning of his death:

"... Then Cenn Berraide arose and brought the head to Dún Delgan, and gave into Eimher's hand; and she had it washed and put on its own body, and Eimher took it to her, and she clutched it to her breast and her bosom after that, and began to bewail and lament over him, and began to kiss his lips and drink his blood, and she put a silken shroud about him.

Cú Chulainn.'

And she took his hand in her hand, and began to tell forth his fame and renown, and she said: 'Sad is this,' said Eimher, 'many of the kings and princes and champions of the world were sent to death and dreadful doom by the swift blows of this hand, and many of the birds and witless creatures of the earth fell by you, and much of the riches and wealth of the earth was scattered and given away by this hand to the poets and sages of the world.'...

Again we read of the grief at loss and the retelling of what was great and good about the deceased, which unfortunately makes the gravity of the loss all the heavier to bare. There is another text, which also recounts Emer's reaction to learn of Cú's death. Essentially, once Lugaid returns with the recently liberated head of Cúchulain, to be reunited with his body, Emer dies of a broken heart on the spot. It is both a tragic, but terribly romantic sentiment, and something I have always loved about Gaelic literature. People are sometime so overcome with emotion, so overwhelmed with their grief, that their hearts literally break. There is just something I find so genuine and touching in this sentiment; however impractical or romantic. This idea relates to an earlier post I wrote: Men can cry too..., albeit in a slightly different light.

Even in cases where the loss is not one of love (or is perhaps agape as opposed to eros), but of ones friends or comrades, the loss is no less severe. Cáilte mac Rónáin, in the narrative of Acallam na Senórach, spends just as much time retelling of the deeds and adventures of Fionn and the Fianna, as he does quietly weeping. This ties back to something I mentioned above, that the weight of the death is often equated with the worth of the individual. In Cáilte's case, he laments for his friends and family, to be sure, but he also laments that such a generation will never again be seen on this side of the veil. This motif is something which echoes across the centuries, and can be found in what is my favourite of all of the works of W.B. Yates, "The Municipal Gallery Revisited", a poem about Yates solemnly touring the aforementioned gallery, and recounting the luminaries he had the honour of calling comrades, I think the spirit is best summed up in the closing stanza.

Think where man's glory most begins and ends, and say my glory was I had such friends.

Grief, at least in the Gaelic tradition, is personal, but also has a very social or communal element to it. This best expressed in the tradition of "Waking the dead", which I could go on about for quite a while (but that is another matter). Suffice to say that the juxtaposition found in Elagic literature and poetry is also found in the wake. The blending of the joy at a life well lived and the significance of the loss, the frantic frivolity of the guests and the manic wailing of the bereaved combine to provide a catharsis of sorts. The notion that one would be hard pressed to find a more ripping party than an Irish funeral, is of course a bit hyperbolic. While we have innumerable examples of wake games, dancing, drinking and some even less savory activities (and they say folklorists never get to have any fun), it should be noted that the immediate family would seldom participate in the merriment, if at all. In fact, there is a telling line in a traditional song from Newfoundland entitled, "The Night that Paddy Murphy Died", which states this rather emphatically; "As Mrs. Murphy sat in the corner, pouring out her grief...". The song is, itself, considerably ribald, but maintains that the guests in all their raucousness are honouring the deceased in the appropriate way.

It was expected that family members would be despondent, but the wake provided a way to release not only their own grief, but the communities as a whole, and what better way than surrounded by friends and family. The frivolity was understood to be, in no way, an act to diminish the family (or the guests) own grief, but that letting it go was easier during the frenzy of a party. Here again, I suspect the centrality of liminal states comes back. The period between a death and burial, the point between the grief of loss, and the joy of a well lived life, and the very mixed emotions which can build to an explosive, unexpected result. Some have commented on the fact that a lot of Gaelic literature can be terribly depressing, but so to is it equally compelling and joyful. Perhaps that is the point (or a point, at least), that grief and joy are both our constant companions and seldom far apart from one another.

Loss and separation are sad events, and it is perfectly natural, not to mention reasonable, to be saddened by a death. What is important though, is that we recognize the loss and acknowledge it; be it the complex process of a wake, or a simple rabbits prayer.


* A relatively recent, albeit fictionalized, example of a keening can be seen early on during the appropriately depressing film, "The Wind That Shakes the Barley".

Men can cry too...

Grief is a funny thing, you expect that you will act the way you always do, in any given situation and then suddenly you find yourself in an unthinkable position; it is in these places where grief lives. More often than not, grief manifests itself most powerfully when someone close to you dies. This is something I have come to observe during my work in funeral services. People will often expect that they will react to a loss in a stoic manner, and will be able to suppress their emotions; this does occur, but it is remarkably rare. No, grief will hit you when you least expect it, even those who "society" deems ought to repress their emotions, men. A man is "supposed" to be stoic in such situations, sure he will be sad (or else a heartless monster), but he mustn't show such emotions outwardly, that is the "place" of women. Men, are supposed to grin and bare it, right? Not hardly.

I'm not sure where this notion developed, and while it may be an interesting bit of the history of gender roles, in my experience such stoicism is thrown right out. Men grieve; they weep, cry, sob, yell and scream. Men find themselves acting in a way they did not expect, with their emotions pouring forth, with such fury and violence, that their shock is replaced by shame. They become very self conscious of what they are doing, and try their best to bottle the torrent which has weld up inside them, not an easy feat by any standard. Unfortunately being in such a self conscious state, the fear of being perceived as vulnerable, or weak, will often make those individuals react rather gruffly, even harshly, towards those trying to aid them (like a staff member at a funeral home offering a much needed tissue). Are men, especially young men, correct to feel this way? Should their show of grief become a source of shame? Is their emotional vulnerability a sign of weakness? My answer would be a resounding no, but this is not merely my position as someone in funeral service; no this is also my position as a Gaelic polytheist.

It is during these times, I am reminded of Caílte mac Rónáin as depicted in the Acallam na Senórach. Here we see a mighty warrior (though less mighty than he once was) who is still more than a match for any of the obstacles still left in Ireland. Here is a man who has lived for hundreds of years, has seen all those he loved killed or fall before his eyes, but who still has a story to tell. It is between the many adventures and telling, in those quiet times of reflection, that we see just how burdened with grief Caílte truly is. He bears not only his own past, but the past of all those who has gone before him, and he weeps, openly and unashamedly at their loss. At no point does anyone in the text sneer at how pitiable it is to see such a man reduced to weeping. Upon hearing the tragedies which have occurred, his audience will often be moved to tears right along side him.

Such is the burden of all those who survive, of the old warrior at once proud of his past yet also haunted by it. The burden of carrying on in a world where one you loved is no longer, seems to be well understood by our ancestors. There is no scoffing, no mocking of emotional outpourings; rather there is understanding and empathy, and the hope that we should all bear such a loss with dignity and strength. For while grief can be crushing and seemingly endless, it is something which as time goes by, inevitably becomes a constant companion. There, and never far out of mind, but bearable as we go on living.

-Gorm