Sorrow Comes

To live in hearts we leave behind
Is not to die.
THOMAS CAMPBELL, Hallowed Ground












Death has come to us again, and this time it was of one at the first fires. The potter Zarina, has met with an accident that brought about her death. It is so sad on many levels. We tell ourselves that death is a part of life, but that does nothing to assuage the pain and grief that you feel.


She had passed by the stream to see Polunu sitting there at the spot where it happened, staring into the waters. She did not stop. She did not intrude, for she knew he need his time to put all of this into perspective. She wanted to, but she did not stop. She wanted to go and simply sit beside him, to let him know that others cared, and understood, but it was not quite time yet.


She knew what he was feeling, the shock, the disbelief, the urge to ignore it, to deny it, to say it was not true. She had been there and felt all of those things. It would take a day or two for it all to sink in, and when it did, that is when the overwhelming, gut wrenching pain would truly hit. The why? He would question it all, could he have done something differently, were there things that he should have said or done that may have prevented it? There would be thoughts as to things he would have wanted to say, perhaps declarations of feelings. She had seen the two of them together, and had seen the seeds of something deeper beginning to take sprout and had found it a joy to watch, but now that plant would never mature, never truly take root and blossom into what it may have become. The flower would never bloom.


Such pain was felt for him, knowing what he was going through, and what he had yet to endure. She knew that the anger would come. He would curse the potter for what happened, even though it was not her fault. He would curse the skies for taking her, because he would not understand the why of it all. But in time, very slowly the acceptance would come to dwell within him. That is not to say he would forget, or forgive, but he would find his way back to living again. Until this happened, all any of them could do was let him know they were there if needed.


She had shed her own tears, not just for him, or for the lovely Zarina, but for all of them and the loss of such a bright light in their lives. She shed tears for herself, tinged with the memories of her own loss and pain. But these were all shed in the privacy at her own wagons. For the tribe, she would stand strong, for Polunu, she would stand strong, onlyh she would know how deeply the pain was running in her, but she would survive it, it was their way.

So would he.