May 11, 2014

Sentimental Sunday ~ Gone from My Sight


As part of my research for this blog, I often search for old newspaper clippings that pertain to Sicily Island, Harrisonburg and other communities in Catahoula Parish.  On a recent search I came across the following article from the February 20, 1960 edition of the Monroe Morning World in Monroe, Louisiana:


What a sweet and special 'find' for me!  This community stork shower was given in honor of my mother just a few weeks before my birth.

On this Mother's Day, I honor the memory of my mother who passed from this life on January 25, 2012.  I honor her memory with the following poem written by Henry Van Dyke.

Gone From My Sight

I am standing upon the seashore.
A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the moving breeze and starts for the blue 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.
She is just as large in mast, 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 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!"


Yes, my mother is gone from my sight.  Gone but for a time. 



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