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Poetry is just the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash. Leonard Cohen

Saturday, August 6, 2011

Balloons

 *This one is in honor of all the kids at Camp Phoenix, the hospice camp where I volunteered this week. They've all had someone close to them recently die.

image source
Balloons aloft are lifted to the sky
Up to the clouds above they rise to meet
those who've passed from this life on to die
and left us here bereft and incomplete

The wind will get them where they need to go
with messages and wishes we have sent
to those we'll always love with hope they'll know
just how much they're missed and what they meant

From sun, from sadness tears are in our eyes
We watch as our balloons sail higher still
Vanishing, we whisper our goodbyes
Like bright hued birds they fly away; yet still

Our gazes linger after they have gone
knowing we will soon have to move on.
submitted for Poetry Jam, Elegies

6 comments:

Brian Miller said...

smiles. have done this act before...releasing burdens/messages in the balloons it is quite the sight and experience...feel for those kids and glad you were there for them...

JustRex said...

That a good little cleansing thing. I wish I would have thought of it myself. You should print that out and post it up on the wall at the hospice.

Fireblossom said...

Poor kiddoes. Bless them.

Bryan White said...

Once when I was kid, there was some kind of thing for school where we all let balloons go like that from a field in a park on the other side of town. I got home later that day, and found that one of the balloons had landed on the roof of my house.

Enchanted Oak said...

A touching reflection on the fact that love doesn't die but lives on, hoping the dearly departed know how much they're missed.

Rachel Hoyt said...

What a beautiful thought. It makes me want to send a baloon to my grandma... :)