Guest Column written by Donna Stoneham
My beloved mother Mary Bond, one of the most loving people I have ever known, died fourteen months ago.
Since her passing, she’s continued sending messages my way that I ‘hear.’
One of the things she told me after she died was that my work in the world was to help create heaven on earth.
This past year of grieving has proven to be a dark night of the soul and I’ve struggled to understand what she meant by her message.
I’ve known it was about being mindful of expressing love and kindness in the world. What I’ve also come to understand is that creating heaven on earth means bearing witness and holding with compassion all that is right and all that is wrong with this world. It’s not all about joy and bliss. I believe we can not experience true joy unless we also know sorrow.
I’ve also come to appreciate that life is so fragile.
As my friend Sandra says so beautifully, “Our spiritual journey is to develop the capacity to take a long, loving, look at the real.”
For me, creating heaven on earth has been developing the ability to navigate the intersection of beauty and loss.
I was blessed to have my mother as a wonderful teacher to help me learn what that means, and for that, I am deeply grateful.
This is a poem I wrote about what I’ve learned and in honor of my mother.
Donna Stoneham
Executive Coach
Author of The Thriver’s Edge: Seven Keys to Transform the Way You Live, Love and Lead
Beauty and Loss
by Donna Stoneham
After you died
You told me my work now
Was to help build a bridge
Between heaven and earth.
To do my best
To bring love and comfort
To a hurting world.
To trade in the currency
Of kindness,
And offer my heart
To those
Who needed care.
I once believed
That creating
Heaven on earth
Meant cultivating
A garden of joy,
Yet now I know
Its’ roots are much deeper,
Its’ veins,
More complex,
Its’ strength,
More fragile.
In the compost of loss,
Its tendrils are formed
Through the dark night of death.
And true beauty
Cannot blossom
Without the nutrients
Of patience, faith, and hope.
Now I see
That the integration
Of beauty and loss
Is possible,
And a necessary stage
Of resurrection
And ascension,
Into a rose
Once battered and bruised,
By the elements of grief.
Now capable
Of fully blooming
As a living testament
To the power
Of your ever present love.
For my Mother,
Mary Ruth Bond
April 22, 2019
Martin Rutte
