In A Cluster of Maples
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On Sunday our daughter Hannah and her husband Dale came to visit. They are traveling through the valley of the shadow of death and they didn’t want to it alone.
They came over from their home in Grand Haven to visit. They brought their broken hearts with them. We stood in a very, very sad little circle by a cluster of trees on Bittersweet Farm and committed the remains of their precious little Lakelyn Dale to the earth.
Lois put a statue of a little girl over the spot and with that gesture the ground there became holy ground–a sacred place. Wendell Berry once wrote;
“There are no un-sacred places;
there are only sacred places
and desecrated places”
For the most part I deeply agree with the statement, but this little spot at the foot of the shady cluster of maples became especially consecrated to us in that moment.
In giving tiny Lakelyn Dale a place on the earth and in speaking her name, I could feel a measure of healing flow into each of our hearts. We held hands and prayed and tears feel to the green earth.
Today they will celebrate their fifth anniversary. The day Hannah was married she danced and I’ve never seen her so joyful. Sunday she mourned and I’ve never seen her so sad.
There is a time to weep and there is a time to laugh
There is a time to mourn and there is a time to dance
This is a season of weeping and mourning. There will be sunny days of laughter and dancing again… like the day we all see the little girl named Lakelyn we never met but loved for a few weeks.
Ken Pierpont
Bittersweet Farm
Summit Township, Michigan
August 15, 2018
