Grieving

I don't know if the dead grieves, their own death or those whom she or he had left behind. It's something I will not know until I'm dead; but, then, I won't be able to tell anyone alive.

But death ravages the bereaved. It wrenches our heart and tears our body and soul; and we grieve privately and mourn in funerary rites publicly. To those of us reared in older cultures, the American custom of mourning turned upside down into celebration of life, which is more and more prevalent of late, seems a curious perversion. It bespeaks optimism cosmetically forced on the dead; it is meant to comfort the bereaved but deprives them of the indispensable process of healing. The wake does not celebrate; it tries to make the loss bearable as we mourn. Funerals are for grieving.