When your time comes, it just comes. In one instant, you will draw in your last breath, in another, you will “expire.” Everyone does this. Everyone who sees and knows and feels himself to exist, does this.
I have been keeping the death vigil for my dear friend Lee, armed with the knowledge of others who have gone this way. Still, there is no knowing ahead of time how it will unfold. We cannot orchestrate this event called death. The guru says, “You are very close.” Thus, the aspirant lives in anticipation of ultimate freedom and continues on. This is how I kept the death vigil for Lee.
The eyes tell us much about the inner state. When words and actions cease, the eyes whisper and tell us what is needed next. We are afraid but cannot speak. We are not even sure of what we are afraid of. We resist this passage, this inevitability called death. Who will tell us that it is okay? We, who have not yet approached the portal? Yes. We do just that. Death is as natural as birth. It is a laboring. It is a difficult effort besieged by uncertainty. Death is a mystery.
I am looking at her breath and counting. I am watching closely for what I know to be the signs of imminent death. I see them but I do not know the hour or the moment it will come. Death is not a thief in the night. Death is not the enemy. It is a sweet Wing of Light, slipping through mortal flesh and carrying the soul toward eternity.
I tell her, “The universe is infinite and inexplicably beautiful.” “You will fly free now.” I say all the things of love and worth and forgiveness and release. And realize I am all of those things come alive to be given away as gifts for the journey she must take.
I wait for the moment the Wing will come. I surround her with sacred chanting and the sounds of ocean waves breaking upon the shore. I sing to her and am taken in to the chamber of my own heart ~the One heart~ by the sweetness of it all. Now, there is only love. I hold her, and stroke her hair like her mother never did. I tell her I love her. I thank her for her life. I let her go and bow in gratitude, slipping away myself to let the Wing of Light come in and carry her toward eternity.
And She does.
