beginnings & endings

A Psalm
of beginnings and endings

Deborah Beach Giordano
© September 19, 2009

Today I greeted my Jewish friends
with L’shanah tovah –
wishes for a blessed, happy New Year;
a time of honey-coated apples,
symbols of our hope
for sweet and joy-filled
beginnings.

Today we greeted old friends
with words of sympathy
and prayers for peace of mind
in a church filled with flowers,
garbed in black and stained with tears
symbols of a grief-laden
ending.

Endings and beginnings,
laughter and weeping,
sorrow and delight
side by side,
pressing close together,
becoming in my imagination
inseparable.

Two sides of a single coin,
morning and evening
of a single day.
Perhaps God’s language
is one of those where
“hello” and “goodbye”
is the same word.

Today I watched the sun set
in a brilliant display.
Red and orange and pink –
radiant banners flung across
the sky’s deepening blue.
It looked as if the heavens
were celebrating.

I didn’t see this day
at its beginning;
the sun arose before I did.
But I am nearly certain
that it was as beautiful
and festive
as its ending.

Sunrise and sunset;
the beginning and the ending,
each an aspect of the other,
both beautiful, blessed,
and awe-inspiring.
Each one leading to the other,
inseparable.

All things came into being through him. What has come into being in him was life,
and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness shall never overcome it.
~ The Gospel according to John 1:3-5