Letter to daughter,
Viola Darlene Cirilo Hayes

Dear Dolly -- Quote "Almost the baby" unquote,

First of all, I know what you mean by "almost the baby" : We had to put up such a battle to keep Lydia until maturity. Then again, you were the last little girl to leave us.

And Lydia, the doctors sure wanted to take the fetus. To save your mother from cancer, they said. But we had a God that they knew not, so you got your baby sister ... I did not have to go to jail for standing with her and God cured your mother. Love and faith were predominant.

Still I hope you know about the special place you have in our hearts and in our lives. Each of our children has their special cubby hole and each holds our hearts in wonder and in love and not one can satisfy for the other, only for himself; for each is entire and never stands alone in God's knowledge and in our understanding of our own.

Each child, tho' grown, has been the baby which we still nurture with love and bear with thanksgiving unacclaimed; and in the sweetness of family let there be laughter and sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little infractions, if any, the heart, nevertheless, finds its mornings and is refreshed.

Gracious words are tools we learn from poets but sentiment and truth is our own reality.

Famous words: "To thy own self be true." So do we seek each other ... with hours to fill our need to love, but not our emptiness. Our emptiness is our secret place with God where, in hoping to acquire, we must first sow in unselfishness with divine simplicity. It is God's commandment that we love one another. "If you would have friends [be one] show yourself friendly."

While the heart of man is out there chasing butterflies, our emptiness is Gods plan - his dream for our fulfillment. Take a peach: its emptiness is its hard seed at its death; how then burst into the sunlight to fructify. So tender the sprout, so hard the earth. So heavy the clod, so obvious the miracle.

Our emptiness is a call to prayer ... a flower freely breathing its fragrance in the wind.

You and yours are roots. And family ... Family is not only a need but an ecstasy. Christ said "Before [this and that] I was." Or did He say "I am"?

Before the next baby you were. Yes, "almost the baby" is a most tender expression. But once a baby, always a baby to somebody, no matter age.

Eight [babies] are rather a heart enflamed and a soul enchanted within us.

Thank you, Dolly. All things we can say of our roots are in rhythm with the autumn leaves dancing in the wind and of beauty with a drift of snow in her hair. We are God's disdainful "Earth O earth!" Seeds sleeping under a blanket of snow or fruitful branches in honor proffering one another. ... The old branches fall away and the new hold sway like sails in the wind. The way of the soul.

We are a grafted vine. Roots entwined genetically, pressed to the earth for nutrients from the beginning of time and with our prayers and our cries come the sound of wings - angels forever in flight, toilers over our soul coming from the windows of heaven - doing battle over our righteous emulation, for our salvation. Our call is their strength. Their beauty is our eternity and our soul, to them, like a garden forever in bloom. How dearly God loves our soul!

He said "I will never leave you nor forsake you." In him we live, breath, and have our being. Even as God is for your growth He is for your pruning ... old things fall away, all Cirilo names ... all Hayes become new faces, but our soul finds its wings and is gone.

Our life here fadeth like the grass and withers like the flowers. God giveth, God taketh away. Even those who limp go not backwards. Verily, when good is hungry, it seeks food for it's soul ... but you who are strong see that you do not limp before the lame. Let not your light be darkened.

When Shannon comes home, love is there. Mother be mother, Dad be dad, brother be his little brother and seek never to grow beyond his first embrace. He needs to love. To be loved. Let God be God.

Like I said, even as God is for your growth, He is for your pruning. Tho' God's voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste to the garden, when He speaks Believe in Him! So shall God gather us unto Himself. So shall every winding river find it's way to the freedom of the spacious ocean.

Christ was a man of sorrow acquainted with grief ... of like passion as we are ... to know the pain of too much tenderness. To be wounded of your own understanding of love and still be painfully gouged by others. To wake at dawn beside an empty cradle, yet give thanks for another day of loving [in sacrificial tears]. Like: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."

God is raising a tough breed of preachers beyond our scope of vision for the near tribulation time; and others perfect in gentleness ... some like orchids in the hot house and others like cactus in the heat of the desert.

Family, Let love be a moving sea between your souls and not a chain. Pray and rejoice together but let each of you be alone with God, and nevertheless you shall be together in the silent awareness of God. Doesn't one body have many cells and one church body many members?

When you are blessed abundantly, say not to the poor "Where is your blessing?" When you are in your long sleeves, say not to the naked "Where is your garment?" When you have a sound mind, say not to the demented "What's the matter?" Rather say, "Son, you are a survivor, your zeal will endure but don't hurt the church - I love you, but go put on your shirt for their sake."

And what greater courage and confidence can there be than - - say the charity of friendliness. Be friendly. Let not passion, the lust for cold murder, quell the spirit of the church. Nor, of course, complicity lull you to sleep and make mockery of your sound mind.

Anger is passion amuck, out of control. Shall we not all dwell in tombs made by the ungodly - dead for the living? Morticians all. Do not the buzzards clean the face of the earth for their dinner? But if you fear or expect only love's peace and love's pleasure, it is just as well that you cover your nakedness with a fig leaf and walk out of God's thrashing floor from where the grain is polished.

Tho' we pray for rain there is no heavy rain without thunder and lightning. The rain and the snow melt into the ground but God is glorified when the poppies grow. The deeper sorrow carves out your being, the more room made for joy to contain. You seemingly lose a loved one but you have learned to love. You have mellowed and tendered. Wasn't He a man of sorrow acquainted with grief?

*** Christ wept  ...  And we also. ***

Lovingly, Your Dad and Mom:
Eleazar Cirilo and our little Bird, Adina Orlea

*** Children  ...  Behold thy Mother. ***

by Eleazar Cirilo, n.d.
All works here, Copyright © Lotus D. Cirilo, 1999

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