The Good Cry Poem by Grant House

Shhh..
Listen
I know there are lives
No, whole worlds
That do not exist today
Because of decisions you and I and others made
Sometime long ago and far away

Decisions that at the moment
Seemed innocuous
Hardly of consequence
Small choices that at the time
Seemed correct, necessary or made a world of sense

This road taken
That one not
Our entire lives are permeated
With a panoply of unrealized possibilities
Things we may have done if only we had just a little longer waited

Like parallel universes
Side by side with the one we find ourself in
Coexisting like poorly remembered vivid dreams
The ones we must ignore to carry on
The lives we could have lived it seems

The family you did not have
The city you never lived in
That career you knew would be yours in time
The places you never went to
The lover you left behind

This phenomenon
Leaves me to wonder
If those worlds don't live on still
For promises we have kept
For the ones we never will

Yet I have to think your life and mine
May be richer now, more sacred
For the loves we said goodbye to
For the travels we did not take
For the things we did not do

My mother never told her two little boys
About how as a young woman
A couple years out of high school
She received a letter inviting her to join
The Robert Shaw Chorale

She never told us about the highly prized scholarship she had earned
And the musical career she had begun in earnest
Her broad range from soprano to contralto
A voice from heaven that would lift a concert hall
That voice, piano, and the cello

How her mother became seriously ill
Her brother in the service in the Pacific in World War Two
With her whole life spread out ahead
How she chose to return home
To care for her dear mother instead

She would confide in us before Dad came home from work
She would say, You just have to have a good cry sometimes
Her boys worried they had done something wrong
To have heard her through the bedroom door
Sobbing deeply, a different kind of heart full song

I can hear her as I write this now
It brings me tears to remember
Her crying and trying to be quiet with all her might
Her coming out of her room wiping her eyes
Hugging her little boys looking up, their eyes so bright
She, still shaking
Oh, I love you so
Mother's going to be alright

She gave her life to us and to Dad
But also to her music on the smaller stage of our little church
And local houses of worship
And to an organization she founded to give aspiring musical students
Invaluable mentoring and a scholarship

She chose to live the life she had
Her spirit going out with them in their careers in lieu of hers
She lived a life of service, gratitude and dedication
To empower young people just like she had been
To realize their dreams, their gifts, their education

My oh my

There are places we have not seen
There are precious people we once loved
There are lives we have not led
Careers and hopes and dreams we did not fulfill
And then there are these lives we did

I offer gratitude to all the lives I did not lead
Appreciation for the one I live today
How grateful I must be
For the decisions made so long ago
For the path my mother took that made me me

Thank you Divine Spirit
For who we have become
For the one amazing world in which we live
For all the opportunities we dare not miss
And yes, let's not forget, for all we have to give

This Now is ours, let's live it
Let's love one another
And give it all we've got
Let's live lives we will be proud of
Because, without regret, we gave it our best shot!