Earlier this month, my aunt Carole passed away. She was a kind soul and will be greatly missed. My cousins asked me to write something for her memorial service, which I did… with the blessing of my family, I’m sharing it here.

A contented heart – a nesting bird – stayed close to the sea,

making her way down a long coast,

encountering an ever-changing shoreline.

Weathered with wings small and steely

were winters and springs,

be they bitter or bold;

 

catching shifts in the wind,

shielding the brood,

and gliding toward flocks familiar.

 

With pine needles, bits of white birch

and feathers pulled from her back,

she quietly built a home;

 

delicately woven,

proudly completed

and resting where the sand meets the water.

 

~ Jaclyn Carole Stevenson, 2013

 

Photo note – the picture above was taken at my parents’ wedding in 1957, when Carole was about 16. Word has it, after the ceremony, she and my Aunt Sharon (on dad’s side) went carousing down by the Chatham, Mass. Coast Guard Station, and that’s when Carole met my Uncle John. Don’t you just love it.