And like seeds dreaming beneath the snow your heart dreams of spring.

Trust the dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.

Your fear of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he stands before the king whose hand is to be laid upon him in honour.

Is the shepherd not joyful beneath his trembling, that he shall wear the mark of the king?

Yet is he not more mindful of his trembling?

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and melt into the sun?

And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing.

And when you have reached the mountain-top, then you shall begin to climb.

And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

from The Prophet, Kahlil Gibran (1883–1931)

Gone from My Sight

I am standing upon the seashore.

A ship at my side spreads her white

sails to the morning breeze and starts

for the blue occan.

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.

She is just as large in mast and hull

and spar as she was when she left my side

and she is just as able to bear her

load of living freight to her destined port.

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.

Henry Van Dyke (1852–1933)

The Wheel

Time is a wheel: the day that we met

Is still there:

Everything changes but nothing is lost

All that we shared,

All that we ever loved, belongs to us still:

Time is a wheel

Whatever has ended is just about to begin

All that we feel,

All that we ever felt, will come back again

Time is a wheel

The sound of your laughter, the rain in your hair,

Your hand in mine,

Your knock at the door, your step on the stair –

All are still there

Because time is a wheel and death will come round

As birth will come round

As love will come round, as peace will come round,

As joy will come round,

As life will come round, because time is a wheel

Bringing back, even yet,

All that we ever shared, and the day that we met.

Susan Stocker (1962–)

Live Your Life

Live your life that the fear of death

can never enter your heart.