Depending how things are going I may or may not catch Radio 4 'Sunday Worship' before leaving for church.  This morning I was keen to listen because I knew that it would be something a little different, and something very special.

Richard Littledale is a Baptist minister, roughly my age, who wife died last year after living with cancer for seven years.  Courageously, Richard has shared his story of grief through social media and on 'Thought for the Day'.  Today's broadcast was tender, profound, courageous, honest and generally awesome.

If you read this within a few weeks of me posting, you should be able to find the recording here...

It included this poem, with the music of Enrico Moriconi's 'Gabriel's Oboe' in the background...

Sightseers into Pilgrims    by Evangeline Paterson

I used to think --
loving life so greatly --
that to die would be
like leaving a party
before the end.

Now I know that the party
is really happening
somewhere else;
that the light and the music --
escaping in snatches
to make the pulse beat
and the tempo quicken --
come from a long way
away.

And I know too
that when I get there
the music will never
end.