Forever in Our Hearts

Avery Autumn Zaleski

The tide has gone out, farther than the eye can see, pulling with it every ship, the sun, and every single wave; stealing hopes, plans, agreements, and a thousand precious things; leaving a shattered seabed of lost shells, secret wishes, dying reeds and impossible questions… And there is the feeling that life will remain emptied, slack like this, much longer than we can bear… How could the ocean return and moonlight shimmer upon it? We pray one day to drag our courage to the ravaged and restless shoreline, face the horizon, looming, and find ourselves opening, reaching, calling beyond our mourning. We pray life responds, gently urging, This one we love has moved on, yet somehow we are not finished. Love grows the heart. So does sadness. Within each of us, a warm harbor of memories, visions, sorrows and joys. Where light breaks on distant waves, gulls glide above the incoming sea, and the soul of our loved one is whispering, Fear not. Carry on. I am with you… I am grateful. I am loved. And I’m free. ~Ingrid Goff-Maidoff