The Center ~ Molly Senecal

The Center

I stand in the center

of all – this –

that ordinary folks call life.

But I know that this tangible, one-dimensional collection of

minutes, days and years

is not life.

For most, the years fly by, like scattering cards, a carousel gone awry,

a black and white picture show played too quickly, a hurricane even

and we are all too easily consumed by the blur.

But I stand in the center, holding the words he died in my hands,

my words of love, longing, and loss blow in the storm around me,

and catch on the bones of grief at my feet.

My words flap bravely like Tibetan prayer flags, holding fast onto the beautiful altar at my feet.

each one a lament

each one a devotion

each one holding up a light for another sister in sorrow.

There are times when I am both now and then, here and there,

(maybe I am nowhere)

but one thing I know to be true – I am always with you, my child, and you are always with me.

How am I able to conduct this trick of time? This miraculous folding of time and space?

Just as a man was able to convert water to wine through love,

I am able to hold fast to who you were and who you are now – through love.

My dear, it has always been love.

The tether that connects me to you,

that connects this world to all the other worlds that are unknown to me right now.

And I am eternally grateful to have loved you (to love you still)

and to be loved by you from this holy space in the –

– center.

For Joanie and Douglas - thank you for holding the light for all of us who came before and after. By Molly Senecal, 7/13/24