"Dear Ancestor" by William Butler Yates
"Your tombstone stands among the rest Neglected and alone. The name and date are chiseled out On polished marble stone. It reaches out to all who care It is too late to mourn. You did not know that I exist You died and I was born. Yet each of us are cells of you In flesh and blood and bone. Our blood contracts and beats a pulse Entirely not our own. Dear Ancestor, the place you filled One hundred years ago. Spreads out among the ones you left Who would have loved you so. I wonder how you lived and loved I wonder if you knew. That someday I would find this spot And come to visit you." ~ William Butler Palmer
Poem: Dear Ancestor
On this All Souls’ Day (November 2nd), there are many different traditions from around the world to honor our dead. The simplest is taking the time to visit the cemetery. Looking into the past, the ancestors that we can never really know stretch back through time, weaving us into the web of the planet and letting us know that we belong.
Loved the poem Ancestor! Somehow, when cremation is the choice for final arrangements, this falls short of some visiting .and some viewing, but then again, will the present generation feel that ‘family’ pull?