Poem: “All Souls” by May Sarton

 Did someone say that there would be an end,

An end, Oh, an end, to love and mourning?

Such voices speak when sleep and waking blend,

The cold bleak voices of the early morning

When all the birds are dumb in dark November – 

Remember and forget, forget, remember.

 

After the false night, warm true voices, wake!

Voice of the dead that touches the cold living,

Through the pale sunlight once more gravely speak.

Tell me again, while the last leaves are falling;

“Dear child, what has been once so interwoven

Cannot be raveled, nor the gift ungiven.”

 

Now the dead move through all of us still glowing,

Mother and child, lover and lover mated,

Are wound and bound together and enflowing.

What has been plaited cannot be unplaited – 

Only the strands grow richer with each loss

And memory makes king and queens of us.

 

Dark into light, light into darkness, spin.

When all the birds have flown to some real haven,

We who find shelter in the warmth within,

Listen, and feel new-cherished, new-forgiven,

As the lost human voices speak through us and blend

Our complex love, our mourning without end.