Ruth (Sacred Love)

Ruth Holcomb Powell

Aug. 10th 1941- Sept. 2nd 2017

I lift you up and cherish the gifts, lessons and message you brought to us and for us...
These most precious of all things, they can not be bought, nor can they be sold, for you brought them forward to all of us.

When I look at your hands and I search out the works of those most beautiful of hands, I can see your works, I can see that you brought forth all the ancestors of our past generations. Within the gathered assembly of your two hands, I can see my grandmother and I can sense my grandfather and I can hear all of the grands from our past. When I look at my own hands, I see you there in the midst of them. You bring to me a new sense and meaning of what it is to be a sacred speck within a grand and vast gathering, dancing, swirling and floating about within the ancient flow that brings life to all that will open to receive its flow.

You were planted under a great evergreen pine tree, a tree that never sleeps and yet it never awakens, through out all our seasons it has remained steadfast, an ever watchful, patient guardian that reminds us that there is within us a part that needs no sleep and needs no wakefulness, it lacks in no thing and therefore contains within it all things. This tree greets us with celebration at every season of our life. And its companion tree which you lay beneath is small and yet most beloved, it brings love in a sweet and simple spirit that reaches out to all that feel insufficient and insignificant. Our dogwood tree who's spirit has chosen to grow low and close to all that it holds precious and sacred...

But the sweetest things in life are always free
Like the songs the birds would sing
And the sweet new grass of spring
And the sacred blossoms on the dogwood tree

– Heartsong: Dolly Parton

It wasn't until I stood sheltered under these trees and had a sacred family secret revealed to me...

Your most beloved and favored conveyed it to me...

He said he couldn't withhold these hidden seeds, they come at no cost and they freely feed...

He proclaimed... "Aunt Ruth found favor in me!"

Then each little bird sang, "and in me", "and in me",  "and in me".... we are all favored under aunt Ruth's tree. We all received that sacred seed, by water and blood it will feed, ever flowing in the gentle touch she bestowed on me...and me..and me...

From the mouth of our smallest, sweetest little seed, she called out, "Aunt ROOF!"

She sheltered me...and me...and me...

A season well lived and a harvest well received, everyone and everything that enters under the wings of my tree, help me to remember the sacred seeds of the evergreen tree who saw it all and celebrated, one by one, the personal sacredness of "We".