If you love a flower that lives on a star, it is sweet to look at the sky at night. All the stars are a-blossom with flowers.

And at night you will look up at the stars. Where I live, everything is so small that I cannot show you where my star is to be found. It is better like that. My star will just be one of the stars, for you. And so you will love to watch all of the stars in the heavens. They will be your friends.

All men have the stars, but they are not the same things for different people. For some, who are travellers, these stars are guides. For others, they are no more than little lights in the sky.

But all these stars are silent. You – you alone – will have the stars as no one else has them and in one of the stars, I shall be living. In one of them, I shall be laughing when you look at the sky at night.

And when your sorrow is comforted, for time soothes all sorrows, you will be content that you have known me. You will always be my friend. You will want to laugh with me. And you will sometimes open your window, just for that pleasure.'

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

There is no night without a dawning
No winter without a spring
And beyond the dark horizon
Our hearts will once more sing ….
For those who leave us for a while
Have only gone away
Out of a restless, care worn world
Into a brighter day

—Helen Steiner Rice

These things I know:

how the living go on living

and how the dead go on living with them

so that in a forest

even a dead tree casts a shadow

and the leaves fall one by one

and the branches break in the wind

and the bark peels off slowly

and the trunk cracks

and the rain seeps in through the cracks

and the trunk falls to the ground

and the moss covers it

and in the spring the rabbits find it

and build their nest

inside the dead tree

so that nothing is wasted in nature or in love.

—Laura Gilpin

Do not hurry 

As you walk with grief; 

It does not help the journey. 

Walk slowly, 

Pausing often; 

Do not hurry 

As you walk with grief. 

--Eli Jenkins

As we look back over time  
We find ourselves wondering  
Did we remember to thank you enough  
For all you have done for us?  
For all the times you were by our sides  
To help and support us  
To celebrate our successes  
To understand our problems  
And accept our defeats?  
Or for teaching us by your example,  
The value of hard work, good judgement,  
Courage and integrity?  
We wonder if we ever thanked you  
For the sacrifices you made.  
To let us have the very best?  
And for the simple things  
Like laughter, smiles and times we shared?  
If we have forgotten to show our  
Gratitude enough for all the things you did,  
We're thanking you now.  
And we are hoping you knew all along,  
How much you meant to us.  

-- Clare Jones

Everything that slows us down and forces patience,

everything that sets us back into the slow circles of nature, is a help.

Gardening is an instrument of grace.  
 
Help us to be ever faithful gardeners of the spirit,

who know that without darkness nothing comes to birth,

and without light, nothing flowers. 
 
-- May Sarton

I have to believe  
That you still exist  
Somewhere,  
That you still watch me  
Sometimes  
That you still love me  
Somehow.  

I have to believe  
That life has meaning  
Somehow  
That I am useful here  
Sometimes,  
That I make small differences  
Somewhere.  

I have to believe  
That I need to stay here  
For some time,  
That all this teaches me  
Something,  
So that I can meet you again  
Somewhere. 

-- Ann Thorp

I shall pass this way but once;

any good that I can do or any kindness I can show to any human being;

let me do it now.

Let me not defer nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again. 
 
-- Etienne de Grellet

We are not sure of sorrow,
And joy was never sure;
To-day will die to-morrow;
Time stoops to no man’s lure;
And love, grown faint and fretful,
With lips but half regretful
Sighs, and with eyes forgetful
Weeps that no loves endure.

From too much love of living,
From hope and fear set free,
We thank with brief thanksgiving
Whatever gods may be
That no life lives for ever;
That dead men rise up never;
That even the weariest river
Winds somewhere safe to sea.

Then star nor sun shall waken,
Nor any change of light:
Nor sound of waters shaken,
Nor any sound or sight:
Nor wintry leaves nor vernal,

Nor days nor things diurnal;
Only the sleep eternal
In an eternal night.

-- Algernon Charles Swinburne

Now I am gone, now I am lost to you 

Find me again just as you used to do: 

In the house – when you go from room to room you’ll find 

The bits and pieces that I’ve left behind. 

In the street – of course . . . I’ve stopped to window-shop; 

You carry on, my love, I’ll catch you up. 

At night – as darkness slowly fills the sky: 

I’m late; don’t fret; I’ll be there by and by. 

At morning – when the sky is still blue-black, 

I had to go out early: I’ll be back. 

In sunshine – as you peer into the glare – 

A shape that seems to be both light and air. 

In rain – as you look out and people pass – 

One leaves a reflection printed on the glass. 

In the garden – when you doze away the hours 

I pass with a smile on my face, and my arms full of flowers. 

  -- Lisa Kitson

It is easily forgotten, year to 

year, exactly where the plot is, 

though the place is entirely familiar 

a willow tree by a curving roadway    

sweeping black asphalt with tender leaves; 

damp grass strewn with flower boxes, 

canvas chairs, darkskinned old ladies 

circling in draped black crepe family stones,    

fingers cramped red at the knuckles, discolored    

nails, fresh soil for new plants, old rosaries; 

such fingers kneading the damp earth gently down    

on new roots, black humus caught in grey hair    

brushed back, and the single waterfaucet, 

birdlike upon its grey pipe stem, 

a stream opening at its foot. 

We know the stories that are told, 

by starts and stops, by bent men at strange joy    

regarding the precise enactments of their own    

gesturing. And among the women there will be    

a naming of families, a counting off, an ordering. 

The morning may be brilliant; the season 

is one of brilliances sunlight through 

the fountained willow behind us, its splayed    

shadow spreading westward, our shadows westward,    

irregular across damp grass, the close-set stones. 

It may be that since our walk there is faltering, 

moving in careful steps around snow-on-the-mountain,    

bluebells and zebragrass toward that place 

between the willow and the waterfaucet, the way    

is lost, that we have no practiced step there, 

and walking, our own sway and balance, fails us. 

  -- Michael Anania

We trust that beyond absence there is a presence. 

That beyond the pain there can be healing. 

That beyond the brokenness there can be wholeness. 

That beyond the anger there may be peace. 

That beyond the hurting there may be forgiveness. 

That beyond the silence there may be the word. 

That beyond the word there may be understanding. 

That through understanding there is love.  

-- Unknown

The rays of light filtered through 

The sentinels of trees this morning. 

I sat in the garden and contemplated. 

The serenity and beauty 

Of my feelings and surroundings 

Completely captivated me. 

I thought of you. 

I discovered you tucked away 

In the shadows of the trees. 

Then, rediscovered you  

In the smiles of the flowers 

As the sun penetrated their petals 

In the rhythm of the leaves 

Falling in the garden 

In the freedom of the birds 

As they fly searching as you do. 

I’m very happy to have found you, 

Now you will never leave me 

For I will always find you in the beauty of life.

-- Walter Rinder 

Before the sublime mystery of life and spirit,
the mystery of infinite space
and endless time, we stand in reverent awe . . .
This much we know:
we are at least one phase of the immortality of life.
The mighty stream of life flows on, and, in this mighty stream,
we too flow on . . .
not lost . . . but each eternally significant.
For this I feel: The spirit never betrays the person
who trusts it.
Physical life may be defeated but life goes on;
character survives,
goodness lives and love is immortal.

-- Robert G. Ingersoll

They who stand with breaking hearts around this [little] grave, need have no fear. The larger and the nobler faith in all that is, and is to be, tells us that death, even at its worst, is only perfect rest. We know that through the common wants of life—the needs and duties of each hour—their grief will lessen day by day, until at last this grave will be to them a place of rest and peace—almost of joy. There is for them this consolation: The dead do not suffer. If they live again, their lives will surely be as good as ours. We have no fear. We are all children of the same mother, and the same fate awaits us all. We, too, have our religion [belief], and it is this:
Help for the living—Hope for the dead.

-- Robert G. Ingersoll, adapted