Songs Of Joy

Several days ago, I held a woman's left hand as she lay dying, and her middle daughter held her right hand.   The other sisters had decided not to come that day because they couldn't face seeing their mother die.    The mother gasped and her daughter began to flutter with concern.    As I always do, I talked to them both, in the form of a prayer, telling them not to be afraid, telling them they were loved, telling them that the sisters would be okay, telling them that they were safe. When the mother had breathed her last, I stayed with the daughter until her sisters arrived, and then I prayed with them all, promising them that their mother was okay.    

 Later the daughter told me this story: shortly after I left the room, the three of them heard the melodic stroke of a harp. First they blamed one another, believing that one of them had brought a cell phone into the room, but they soon ascertained that there was no phone.   Finally they agreed that the sound had come over the loudspeaker, and that it must be our way of announcing that there had been a death.   

They later found out from a nurse what I already knew.   We don't have a loudspeaker, and the harp sound did not come from us.     

I don't offer any explanation for the sound or its source.   But whatever it was, and wherever it came from, it made all the difference. The sisters stopped judging one another and themselves for what they had or hadn't done for their mom, the pain of their grief was a little less sharp, and they found themselves laughing at the way, they were convinced, their mom had found a way to reach back to give them one last sign of her love.