Posted on 06/11/2004 6:26:25 AM PDT by Pfesser
Reagan wrote, "The poet wrote of seeing a shhip, all sails set, put out to sea. As he watched, the ship grew smaller and smaller and finally was entirely out of sight. It was gone. But then he said somewhere else the ship was coming into view just as large and real as when he'd watched it sail away. It was not gone, it had just gone to another place beyond our sight. It was the poet's explanation of death."
I keep thinking of Michaelangelo's sonnet about the ship leaving the harbor... the poet uses the metaphor of a sea voyage to describe the passage to the afterlife.
FYI the poet was Henry Scott Holland and this is the poem President Reagan was referring to:
"I am standing upon the seashore. A ship at my side
spreads her white sails to the ocean. She is an object
of beauty and strength. I stand and watch her until
at length she hangs like a speck of white cloud just
where the sea and sky come to mingle with each
other.
Then someone at my side says: "There, she is gone!"
"Gone where?"
Gone from my sight. That is all.
Her diminished size is in me, not in her. And just
at the moment when someone at my side says:
"There, she is gone!" there are other eyes watching
her coming, and other voices ready to take up the
glad shout: "Here she comes!"
And that is dying."
I read that poem after my mother in law's funeral to close family and friends. It's beautiful.
Many have spoken of the Honor, and the priviledge of serving with President Reagan. I know that must be true. I also believe that it would be the greatest of pleasure, just to have known this man.
He once waved at me. It made me feel like he knew me.
ping
July Fourth Bump!
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