Praise Song for All the Beginnings

Precious, irreplaceable things pass away, often in a paroxysm of suffering, but life is stubborn, life is undeterred, and for every ending there are a thousand, a million beginnings.

When my mother died, I peeled away the soft white hair I found in her brush and put it in the antique powder jar that my grandmother used as a hair receiver. I kept it for a long time. For just an instant, if I opened the jar, I could remember my mother’s scent.

The year it didn’t smell like her anymore, I draped the skein of white hair across a holly branch. The pointed edges of the leaves held it safe until a chickadee claimed it for her nest.