An Ever-Rolling Stream

Time, like an ever-rolling stream,

Bears all its sons away;

They fly forgotten, as a dream

Dies at the opening day.

Isaac Watts

I am not fascinated with nor am I fixated on death. I do have friends who having reached an age and place in life where they have fulfilled what they believe they were born to do, they are ready to sit quietly and “let the rest of the world go by.”

The fragile craft in which they now floats carries them down that ever-rolling stream which one day will be emptied into the vast ocean called eternity. This immensity is the same ocean from which they came at birth. The time between birth and death is what we call ‘’life,” and is the gift God gives us to use both for good and for ill.

While I do not obsess about death, over my years it has occasionally dropped in for a visit. But he comes, gets my attention, tips his hat and moves on. I suppose recently when he has visited he has decided to sit for a while before suddenly getting up and disappearing as he moves on to the next house.

He visited a few days ago when my living daughter, Beth, phoned telling me of the premature birth of her deceased sister’s grandson. At one pound six ounces, life and death for tiny Nick has been held in a delicate balance.(latest report) But then, death is no stranger to my blood family.

My grandfather died at 78, and my grandmother at 85.

My mother died at 66, and my father at 84.

BUT

My only sibling, Peter, died in his 40s

My son, John, died at 25.

My daughter, Carol, died at 65.

My Great Grandson, Ethan, Beth’s grandson, died at birth.

And now tiny Nick is fighting for life.

Sometimes it almost seems too much.

If for most people exploring the family genealogy has them looking back to discover something about older long-gone relatives, mine is a very different quest. From my grandparents to my great grandchildren I have thus far outlived all the deceased members of my family. As I approach these last years—or days—do I look forward to a family reunion in some pleasant place, all of us picking up where we left off here? While I respect those who hold such a belief, that is not how I understand what is beyond this life. But who knows?

The older I am, and the closer my tiny craft gets to the immensity which is the great eternal ocean, questions about death seem no closer to an answer. The Mystery remains. I do, however, identify with Sidney Lanier who describes death in the conclusion of his poem about that vast area off the coast of Georgia, The Marshes of Glynn.

And now from the Vast of the Lord will the waters of sleep Roll in on the souls of men, But who will reveal to our waking ken The forms that swim and the shapes that creep Under the waters of sleep? And I would I could know what swimmeth below when the tide comes in On the length and the breadth of the marvellous marshes of Glynn.