not the motorcycle diaries

I never fail to be amazed at how the body is not the person. Your cold skin is just skin. Your stiff strands of pure white hair are just hair. I kiss your head, though it is just a head. None of it is you. The body didn’t even really look like you, without your spirit to give it your features, like your smile reflecting the years of mellowing and humbling.

I am glad for the requiem - for the solemnity, the flowers, the prayers, the hymns, the incense, the vestments, the ritual of bread and wine. The body, the casket, the tone of thankfulness and rebirth, of love and of eternity. I watch my father heft his father’s coffin onto his shoulder and hope that when I have children I will understand how all this can be borne with such grace.

Farewell, grandfather of mine. Thankyou for teaching me so much about living.