Release

January 5, 2001
The contents of this message may be irrelevant by the time some of you get it; it is difficult to write an update under these circumstances, when things could change radically at any time.

Timora's blood pressure is extremely low, and her kidneys have failed. There is no longer any hope for her recovery, but we don't know how long she will go on living - it could end today, it could take a few more days. The state of being neither here nor there is very difficult for our family, but we are trying to go on with life as best we can. I still go once a day during the week to the hospital, and the other members of the family visit her when they can. She is now very heavily sedated - thank God, she is not suffering, and indeed suffering is over for her - and so chances are she doesn't know we're there, but still I believe that her soul can still feel a loving presence, and we want her to take that with her when she finally goes.

I feel now that death will be a release for Timora, and believe very strongly that when released, she will enter a mode of being that will be far happier for her than the life that she will have left behind.

Shabbat Shalom.

Love,
Sara

January 5, 2006

1. The Corridor

On one of Timora’s last days in this world, Edna, her Reiki teacher, came to the hospital to lay healing hands on her one more time. As Edna touched Timora and the energy flowed between them, Edna felt, through her fingertips and deep inside herself, that part of Timora’s soul was already on the way to the next world. But another part of Timora's spirit was lingering behind - hesitating to leave us because she was worried about us, did not want to cause us pain - but at the same time longing to be released.

As the energy between them intensified, Edna experienced herself as being together with Timora, in a corridor suffused with light unlike any she had ever seen or sensed. The corridor led toward an even stronger, more beautiful light, which could not then, and can not now, be depicted in words, but seemed to be the source, expression and richness of everything that is Good.

When Edna removed her hands and said her last farewell to Timora’s earthly form, she was left with a feeling that she can only describe as a kind of completeness, a fullness. This feeling, she says, has not entirely left her to this day, five years later. Timora gave her an incomparable gift: having experienced those few minutes of light together with Timora’s spirit, Edna now knows in the deepest sense possible that she has nothing to fear from the other side.

After her release (Edna tells me) Timora's spirit did not stay away for long, and soon returned to became a kind of spiritual guide and teacher for Edna. Every so often, she comes to Edna during Reiki sessions; Edna even sometimes asks her for help and guidance. When Timora comes to Edna, she adds her own spiritual energy to the currents of Reiki moving through Edna’s hands, making them that much more powerful agents of healing.

2. The Release

Six Wings*
With two you covered your face,
Which had bloated, then lost its flesh, then swelled again,
With a pencil you covered the eyebrows that had fallen with all your hair
Which grew back another color each time.
With a wig you covered the dent in your skull that was beautiful
To a small child.
And sometimes you didn’t know which was the real you,
Who had changed a thousand faces, her hair five times

And twice the marrow of her bones.
And with two you covered your legs,
Fragile from without and pressed ever more from within.
At night your legs moved of their own will and you found them no resting-place,
And in daytime they could no longer bear you.
In their place you grew wheels,
On which I wheeled and wheeled you, to the end
Of the universe, and up and down the hospital elevators, whistling and dancing,
Crazy Daddy. But to the end of terror

You rolled alone.
And with two you flew and collided, fell and flew again,
Bound with long and tangled tubes,
Embracing and withdrawing
Welcoming and chasing away
Cursing and blessing
Sinking
And ascending, now without legs, and without a face,
And with one pair of wings.

(Translated from the Hebrew)

Daniel ("Don") Avitzour
Written for the second anniversary of Timora’s passing
10th of Tevet 5763

*See Isaiah 6:2.