My heart has been really heavy lately for many of my friends and family members who have lost loved ones recently. Our community seems to have been hit so hard with death and bereavement over the past few weeks and months, and my prayers and thoughts are with each of you who are reeling from the loss of someone so near and dear to you. This poem that I wrote 21 years ago came to mind. I had revised it recently, during the loss of my Uncle Thomas a few months back. It seems fitting to dedicate this to everyone who is missing a loved one or hurting with new loss at this time.
I originally wrote the following poem three days before the death of my Grandmother (Granny Howard.) I was sixteen years old at the time and heartbroken at the knowledge she only had a few days left to live. She was fighting Melanoma Skin Cancer that had only been diagnosed about nine months before her death. She was not "old" at all, and she was so very vivacious and just plain "cool" for a grandmother. She spoiled us five grandchildren greatly, and as the youngest grandchild, I always felt extra tender-loving attention from her when the "older" cousins left me out of things, or so I thought. :) In April of 1992, she had a small bump come up on the skin around the hip/groin area. She tried treating it herself for a while...after all, it was just a "bump," right? When it showed its stubbornness and wouldn't go away, she went to the doctor about it. After the biopsy came back, it was that dreaded word no one wants to hear: cancer. And it was Melanoma, which was even more disturbing, because it is the most-aggressive and deadliest form of skin cancer. But Granny was young and strong, and the spot was fairly small. A surgery was scheduled to remove the small growth, and everyone felt the prognosis was pretty good. After the biopsy results from the surgery came back, things went from bad to worse...detrimental would be a better word. The cancerous "bump" was located directly above a lymph node in the groin area, and the cancer had invaded that lymph node. Even more disturbing, the cancer had spread from that one small bump to the lymph node, and had gone on to invade her entire lymphatic system. Although she felt fine at the time, the bump had created a much bigger problem, and the situation within was not fine. It quickly took over her entire body, and just nine months after the bump was spotted, she was gone. Just...gone.
I remember the day like it was yesterday. I knew what had happened when I saw my Mom leaving in the car, as I looked out my bedroom window just before getting ready for school one morning. We had semester finals that day at school, and my Dad made me go on to school, so I wouldn't have to make up the exams later. He knows how to be really tough on the inside and outwardly calm and composed in the most difficult of circumstances. After all, he was in the Marine Recon Battalion in the height of the Vietnam War, and he is a church pastor, so he has seen it all and he has seen it often. He deals well with losses outwardly. As a 16 year-old girl losing a grandmother, I did not. I couldn't bear the thought of going to school after hearing that news, but those of you that know my Dad, know that he isn't much on negotiation when he has made up his mind about something, especially when we were children living under his roof. I remember sitting in my 11th-grade Literature class trying to take that exam, and tears were pouring out so quickly that I couldn't prevent them from soaking the scan tron answer sheet. To this day, I am not sure if the teacher ever actually got it to run through the scoring machine or not. It was so hard for me to lose my Granny then, and, as of eight years ago, I have lost all of my grandparents to the grave. Time has a way of healing, but the pain of their loss still hits hard sometimes, at the most unexpected of moments. I pray God's Comfort and Peace upon those of you dealing with loss at this time.
Breaking
Free
Bobbie
Wright Grogan
(January
12, 1993 & 2013)
Breaking
free from my grasp,
I'm
left alone without reason -
Victimized
by a cold and bitter treason.
I ask
again
One
last time
A
spark of hope ignited.
I
pray again
One
last time,
And
hope I have invited.
I
pause to look
One
last time...
A
tear rolls down my cheek.
It is
then I find,
That
I can’t rewind
Only
God’s peace I seek.
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