Famous Last Words

Anyone have a line or passage that just STAYS with you? Mine is the last lines of “The Trees” by Robert Frost.

This is profound to me, as the first time I read it was in 2019, while reading Frost to my dad. Neither of us had ever heard it, despite both being huge fans of Frost and poetry in general. Of course in his case, perhaps he had just forgotten. He was dying. I was too actually (at the time), although nobody knew it. If I'd had known the last line, I never would have read it.

The spoken words left an incredible pang of tension over the room, and neither of us could speak. This would be the last day I ever spent with him. Eventually, I broke the silence by finding some old songs on my phone, and playing them.

I think of that moment now, not with pain. I can recall the sadness and heaviness, but what stands out to me is just how POWERFUL this moment was. How profound. Yes, what was happening was horrible and I had just unintentionally pointed it right out. And we both just sat with it. We sat with the grief.

Distracting yourself or others from pain is only prolonging the inevitable. We are here to learn from all our experiences, even the perceived "bad". What's a line for you? Maybe it's a song? This is rhetorical, share if you want, but more importantly, go sit with your memories. Convert that pain to power.

Much love.