Grief informs Joy
on feeling literally anything positive when you're mourning
My grief informs my joy.
For every smile that graces my face,
or giggle that escapes my lips;
— With every moment of feeling uplifted,
there is a present anchor attached to my heart.
Not weighing me down,
but always there…
alongside the times of happiness.
My grief informs my joy.
Reminding me of how painful it can be to
let
something
go . . .
or to have something
taken away.
My joy
is no longer naive,
nor is it jaded —
But informed.
It knows how fragile happiness can be,
how fleeting cheerfulness is.
My heart now holds both.
For even in sadness,
even in the depth of my grief and loss
I find flecks of joy too.
The memories of innocent love,
lost to the past.
The Hope and excitement
once alive in my bones, blood, and body,
that fluttered in my heart —
No longer something tangible
but a mere remembered thought.
My grief exists because there was joy and happiness and hope and…
Love.
Now my joy, love, happiness, and hope is as intimately related to my grief,
as my grief is to it.
The knowledge of how special it is to feel but a moment of joy,
while your most precious love cannot be seen.
Buried, scattered, or kept in a vessel —
only to be found in this fractured heart that knows both sorrow and sweetness.
There is a wisdom that lives in the joy that a grieving person feels;
it exists without innocence or naivety or an ignorant levity.
Rooted in the knowing,
the memory,
of what is missing.
Of what is
not
there.
Of what cannot be held.
It is a joy that is in relationship with deep pain.
Coloured by something different.
Darker.
And though there is a darkness in the light
woven into the joy of a grieving heart,
it is not tainted or ugly.
But beautiful in a different way.
The scars and wrinkles of a life, lived.
And a heart, loved.
A joy that is reverent and holy.
Well explored to the vast nooks and crannies that contain the caves of suffering in a human’s psyche.
Grief and joy:
natural pendulating states of humanness.
One impossible to exist without the other.
So if you’re freshly grieving right now,
Just know that yes,
you will smile and laugh again;
you will feel joy and happiness return —
But it will be different.
You will know these things with more intimacy;
with reverence…
because you will remember.
You will remember your beloved dead.
And you will remember those early days and the person that was just trying to exist.
Survive.
You will remember the feelings of despair, and sorrow, and pain, and anguish.
You will remember the feeling of your heart being ripped to pieces and your stomach plummeting into your throat.
Upon every ring of laughter will be the echo of mourning.
Every smile holding the hand of a recognizing nod to what once was.
And in those moments of joy,
your grieving heart will whisper:
“I will remember,
because I love you.”
