From Death, Life

On What is Lost, What is Planted, and What Endures

Let’s begin in what seems a haphazard place—death.

But maybe that’s exactly the right place to begin.

For me, life itself emerged from death. Not metaphorically. Literally.

That is the great paradox of my existence—I have life because someone died.

Can you imagine your life springing from death?

The questions flow like tears.

Is it possible that the same eyes that have wept in sorrow might one day weep in joy?

That the days of deep loss might somehow be redeemed across a lifetime?

That a life cut short might still bear fruit through the lives that follow?

I often think of my grandparents—of the grief they carried when their baby girl, my aunt whom I never met, died of whooping cough at just one month old.

The anticipation of pregnancy.

The joy of new life.

The wonder of each unfolding day.

Then—loss.

The unbearable stillness.

The hollow space where laughter once lived.

I wonder where the tears of such grief go.

Do they fall to the cold, hard ground and disappear, like the child who was buried?

Or do they fall upon a deeper soil—one hidden and fertile—preparing itself for something yet to come?

My grandparents visited the small cemetery beside a country church each Sunday. Though they weren’t religious, the people of that church welcomed them, comforted them, held them in their pain. Out of that quiet kindness, something began to grow. Seeds were planted—seeds of hope, of compassion, of renewal—and in time, they decided to have another child they hadn’t planned to have.

That child was my father.

From death, life.

Through that one small life lost, a lineage continued.

Through one act of compassion, a family was reshaped.

Through tears, seeds were sown that would bear fruit for generations.

I sit here breathing, thinking, remembering.

Is it possible that the same eyes which once shed tears of sorrow upon fertile ground might one day shed tears of joy for what was born from that soil?

Is it possible that loss, held with gratitude and love, becomes the very ground of new life?

Is it possible that no act of compassion, no seed of love, ever falls in vain?

We may not be spared suffering. But perhaps suffering itself is not the end of the story—only the soil in which something beautiful, unseen, and enduring is quietly taking root.

Question

How might the sorrows you carry today become the fertile soil of what is still to bloom?

Peace,

Brandon

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