Friday Delay

Was up most of the night cleaning my home (!) and then taking the 4:45 a.m. train to the Big Apple. Met my friend Ginga Eichler from Berlin, and we took the Bolt Bus back to Baltimore.

Here's a Facebook posting after Thursday's funeral:

The late Lois Fessenden Honick was a member of First Unitarian Church of Baltimore, married to Al Honick in 1967 by Rev. Irving Murray. She was a great admirer of A. Powell Davies, and in preparation for this morning, I came across this poem (collected into "Great Occasions" by Carl Seaburg) which spoke dearly to me. Accepting that there is a tremendous problem in any poem that sees the world as wild and unpeopled, ready for pilgrim settlers (whether Cana'an, Massachusetts, "The West," Palestine, etc.), I offered it to her husband as he sits shiva this week.

The world we know is passing: all things grow strange;

all but the stout heart's courage;

all but the undiminished lustre of an ancient dream--

which we shall dream again as [others] have dreamed before us,

pilgrims forever in a world forever new.

And what we loved and lost

we lose to find how great a thing is loving,

and the power of it to make a dream come true.

For us, there is no haven of refuge;

for us there is the wilderness, wild and trackless,

where we shall build a road and sing a song.

But after us there is a Promised Land,

strong from our sorrows and shining from our joys,

our gift to those who follow us

along the road we build

singing our song.