January has always been a month of disproportionate loss.  People who are sick (both physically and emotionally) tend to hold on during the holidays; hoping to spare their loved ones the profundity of grief during a season intended for joy and renewal.

For those who have had loved ones succumb during the month (either naturally or through their own will) I offer one of my favorite e.e. cummings poems as a reminder that the people we love never truly leave us and that love (permanent and resplendent) endures all.

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)

i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)