Our Saints Are Going Home

A poem for All Saints’ Day by Rev. Carol Cook Moore

Our giants are going home. One by one, they run through the tape, leaving us with a wanting that fills the space their bodies, laughter, words of wisdom, and acts of tenderness once occupied.

Our giants are going home. They wink and wave as if to say to those they leave behind, “You’ve got this!”

How on earth could they know that?

I still catch myself re-living the memory of learning from them: In a voice lesson, a meeting, a side conversation, a moment of lament, a kitchen, a classroom, at a ballgame. And we want just one more. We want one more robust laugh together, one more hug, one more chat, one more exchange of gratitude and affection.

We simply want and need our person to keep living as our giant.

How will we continue to learn?

Because my dear friends who remain on this side of life because they have been our giants. We have listened. We have learned. And we will continue to learn as our lives and work unfolds.

They now surround us-that great cloud of witnesses. In our sorrow, in our stinging loss we take the baton, wipe the tears from our faces, and we continue the race.

Behind us are those who need some of us to grow into their trusted giants. Be careful here. Giants do not set out to be that. It is their faithfulness and bold integrity, their compassion and trust that creates the stature of a giant. Coming up alongside us, are the generations now listening and learning.

On this All-Saint’s Day let us bless our giants. “Well done, good and faithful servants. Rest and rejoice in peace and love.”

Through the grief that rises to be released let us release them to the next shore, knowing that the life that separates us is temporal. Those who have gone before us lean in to kiss the tops of our heads.

“Well done” is the mantra they whisper that fuels us with confidence and hope. Our response? Simple. “Well done, indeed.”