Editor’s Note: this interview conducted via email has been lightly edited, and does not necessarily reflect the views of this website.
- What is the first poem that enchanted you?
“To A Skylark” by Percy Bysshe Shelley.
I remember reading this poem when I was in my thirties. I was so enchanted by the feel of the poem, of the uplifting “higher still and higher . . .” – I felt like I was soaring! I wanted to paint the first stanza of this poem on my dining room wall – I just wanted to be enveloped by the words. Interestingly, in retrospect (thank you Melanie), I look at myself going through a traumatic time in my life then, and I can now appreciate the sense of freedom this poem gave me – although, at the time, I could not have verbalized this.
An additional thought about a poem that enchanted me . . . In college I studied Spanish and in my senior year we had a class that was taught in Spanish. I clearly remember my excitement when I was able to read a poem by Federico García Lorca in Spanish and understand it! I think the poem may have been “Romance Sonámbulo” but of that, I cannot be certain.
2. I’d love to hear about your experience as a hospice chaplain. What first drew you to this type of work? What sustains you now in chaplaincy?
When I began college, when asked “what do you want to do?” my answer was always “I want to help people.” This was a fairly standard answer for my generation. I then met Sister Marita Ganley, the Director of the Religious Studies program, who was an idealist and an artist at heart, and I knew that was a path I wanted to follow. Many years later I received my MA in Theology and discovered that I could study CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) in a hospital setting. When I began that program I felt like “a fish in water” and so 30 years later I am still swimming!
What sustains me . . . being with families and patients who are navigating the end of life is a privilege. In my deepest core I feel that I m a witness to love – in its most sorrowful disguise- and that is an honor.
3. Please tell me about a meaningful instance of engaging poetry in a hospice setting. How did this particular encounter shape your overall practice of poetry and grief?
I gave a copy of Jan Richardson’s book The Cure for Sorrow, A Book of Blessings for Times of Grief to a woman whose adult son died. There was a particular poem that I shared with her, “Blessing for the Brokenhearted,” that I felt conveyed a particular sense of understanding of what consolation is (and is not) to a person in grief. She read it at his celebration of life, because the poem really resonated with her. A year later, I read it at her memorial service, because it was so meaningful to her, and because I also felt that it would bring comfort to those who were grieving her loss. I share this poem at all my grief groups and every time I read it, there is a lot of nodding of heads in agreement – the poem says what many are unable or unwilling to verbalize.
4. As you may know, there’s a long tradition in poetry of the elegy, or a poem that mourns someone who has died. Some define elegy more broadly, as any poetry of loss. How do you understand the relationship between the elegy with its contrasting mode of poetry, the ode (which is a poem of celebration)?
This question reminds me of the very nature of grief: sorrow, sadness, lament, love, joy and praise – all living in tension with each other within the heart of the bereaved.
Kahlil Gibran eloquently underscores this in his “On Joy and Sorrow:”
Then a woman said, Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow.
And he answered:
Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.
And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.
And how else can it be?
The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.
Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter’s oven?
And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?
When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.
When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.
Some of you say, “Joy is greater than sorrow,” and others say, “Nay, sorrow is the greater.”
But I say unto you, they are inseparable.
Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.
Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy.
Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced.
When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his silver, needs must your joy or your sorrow rise or fall.
So, as much as they are different, I feel they are cut from the same cloth of life!
5. How do you decide which poems to share with those who are mourning? Are there particular poems that have become familiar friends in such settings? If so, why do you think those verses have staying power?
The poets that I turn to most often are John O’Donohue, Jan Richardson, Mary Oliver, and David Whyte. These poets speak eloquently, from the heart, from the soul. I often say that there are two things people need – one is to be heard, and the other is to be understood. Poetry offers a mirror of the lived experience of grief, at which one looks and sees a reflection of the words unarticulated inside – yet poured forth in a way that they say “yes, yes, this is me.” In that moment, they feel deeply understood. When I facilitate my grief support groups, I often have a book of poems by my side and at the end of the group I will choose one to share which touches upon the feeling or theme of the group discussion. I do favor Jan Richardson’s “Blessing for the Brokenhearted” and “Blessing” by John O’Donohue.
may the clay dance
to balance you.—from “Blessing” by John O’Donohue
6. What advice would you give to someone who wants to engage poetry for those who are grieving?
Find poems that touch your heart, share one, and then allow yourself to be comfortable sitting in silence while the words wrap around the hearts of those who grieve. One poem is plenty.
7. What advice would you give to someone who themselves is in mourning? How can poetry speak to their situation?
Shakespeare wrote in MacBeth “Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak whispers the o-er fraught heart and bids it break.”
I think this quote underlies why I feel it is so helpful for those in mourning to have a place, a safe place, to speak their sorrow. However, I do think that wrapping oneself within the covers of a book of poetry can also feel safe, as the words of others offer a place of comfort and a felt sense of being understood.
8. Is there anything you were hoping I’d ask you that I haven’t asked yet?
The questions were wonderful!
Maureen Ceidro is in her 18th year as a bereavement counselor with Excela Hospice – part of the Independence Health System. She has a master’s degree in theology from St Vincent Seminary. She was the Pastoral Care Director at Jeannette District Memorial Hospital until their merger and has worked in the field of grief, bereavement and chaplaincy for 30 years. She has worked closely with the Fred Rogers Institute to develop a grief support program for children and facilitates grief support programs for adults.
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