For All the Saints

I last wrote about going to my 45th High School reunion and the request for me to do a "memorial service" for those in our class who "are no longer with us." It was an interesting evening. Wow, those people got old somehow.

We looked at a power-point slide show of "the ghosts of High School Past" as we ate our food and chewed on memories. My old girlfriend was there and I spoke briefly with her despite my dear wife's accusation that I flirted with her at our last reunion. I figure we are owed a few reflections from the past. After all she was the first to break my heart. Yes, she fell for an older guy while on a beach trip. She ended up marrying the guy but all I remember is the deep ache that was new to me.

The ache started somewhere below my stomach and came up around my windpipe, then seeped into my chest. It was a strange feeling. I did not know someone could do that to someone else. I had only played with feelings until that point. What was this sensation that felt like a roller coaster going down and not coming up?

So how do "you" describe a broken heart. Anyway I lived even though I thought for a while I would not. Sure we all can laugh now about those first love downdrafts but it sure was not funny then. So all that rushed by as I listened to her tell stories of her grandchildren.

But back to the "saints." Yes I conducted a brief memorial time for those names that were below the pictures that were mounted on a board in front of us. The pictures were from the High School Annual. The all looked so young and so hopeful and now they were memories. They were gone from our midst. It was a somber moment in the swirl of laughter and surprise at how we have changed. So I'll share with you the poem I wrote to read to my classmates. It is based on that reflection I shared with you earlier where many of us gathered just before graduation and sang a song of both hope and desire: "Climb Every Mountain."

I share it with you for those of you who read these words and have climbed your mountains and discovered your valleys....

The Mountain Climbers

We sang of mountains
That could be conquered
And with our knapsacks full of
Hope we set out...
Maps and charts were not needed
For at first we were
Full of hope
That needed only time

But soon we found that mountains
Have valleys between
Their rugged peaks so
We stopped our separate
Marches and joined
Hands with another or many
For in our days
Of youth we dared
Not ask about
the fear of mountain climbing

So today we gather to smile
even about the tears
For remembrance is our tool
That we strike into the side
Of this- yet another peak
That we call "reunion"

And as we stand beside this
Slope of a past whose
Story is much bigger than
The simple song we sang
We step into a sacred silence
As we hold in our hearts
The names of those climbers
Who are beyond the
Range of our gathering
But
Who are not lost to the
One who made all mountains
And who transverses all valleys

Hold on to them
O God who listens so well
To songs of youth
But who knows how quickly
Hope can be swallowed up
As pilgrims on the way
Discover their need
For ropes and charts and
You

So we hear their names and
Speak them tenderly
From yet another mountain
That we climb this day
Hear them O God of all
Knowing...and complete
Their lives that are
So sacred to you...

jody