Grief... and a heavy heart.

I generally don't pay much attention to the news... what I know is from brief glances at the Daily Universe on my way to the crossword puzzle. Friday afternoon I heard about the disaster in Japan. There is something about it that just makes me cry. My heart is heavy for the people there, those who have family or loved ones there. It makes me physically ill. I follow a blog called Seattle daily Photo. It makes me happy to see pictures of the city that I love so much. Today this was their post. 


I read the description and wanted to learn more about Howard Thurman. He was an African-American (baptist?) preacher. Of him it was said that if there hadn't been a Howard Thurman there would not have been a Martin Luther King (interesting, right?). Then I found the following poem which seems to embody that which I feel for the people of Japan who have lost family, friends, homes, livelihoods, etc.:

"I share with you the agony of your grief,
The anguish of your heart finds echo in my own.
I know I cannot enter all you feel
Nor bear with you the burden of your pain;
I can but offer what my love does give:
The strength of caring,
The warmth of one who seeks to understand
The silent storm-swept barrenness of so great a loss.
This I do in quiet ways,
That on your lonely path
You may not walk alone."

(Howard Thurman, "For a Time of Sorrow," Meditations of the Heart, (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1953), p.p. 211-212.)