The Nobel Laureate Wislawa Szymborska wrote one of her wonderful essays on great love, as recounted in today’s edition of the invaluable website Brain Pickings by Maria Popova. When I read this beautiful reflection on love, the first thing that came into my mind was me and Maria.

Then, almost instantly, the second was Carol Gulley.

I was privileged to witness great love in the past weeks as I’ve watched Carol tend to her dying heart, Ed.

In her  essay, Szymborska nodded to the unseeing cynicism with which people often react to things they do not understand, especially the underpinnings of great love, trivialized by popular culture, rejected by political leaders,  incomprehensible to outside observers and even to the lovers who share it.

Szymborska likens great love to the unconscious optimism of plants:

“It’s like the little tree that springs up in some inexplicable fashion on the side of a cliff: where are its roots, what does it feed on, what miracle produces those green leaves? But it does exist, and it really is green – clearly, then, it’s getting whatever it needs to survive.”

I can’t define great love either, but I have seen it every day in the way in which Carol tends to Ed as his brain cancer has begun to consume him.

In a different way, i see it every day in my own life, I believe Maria and I have a great love for one another, I think I know i when I see it.

I have a friend whose wife is dying of a similar cancer to Ed’s.

She is near death, and she is transformed. As often happens with the dying and chronically ill, it becomes difficult for people to see them, touch them, be close to them.

This, like death itself, is rarely spoken of, but watching Penny, a hospice aide, care for Ed every afternoon is a powerful experience, she radiates genuine love and care, and he clearly feels it,  it calms  him and brings him great comfort.

Very few people can do what she does.

My friend has trouble doing the same thing with his wife, who he says he loves very much.

Cancer is not a kind or gentle disease. She smells differently, looks differently, her face and body is shrunk and, to some people, repellent. I have seen this often in hospice work, it is difficult for many people to bear the disintegration of the human body, especially when it is ravaged by an illness like cancer.

My friend shies from touching his wife, or getting too close with her. It bothers him, he says he feels helpless to change.

Doctors and hospice workers all say it is important to touch the dying, to talk to them, sing to them, caress and kiss them. They may not understand what is happening, but psychologists all say they are aware of being touched, and loved.

Yesterday, I sang a song to Ed, I find it hard to talk to him sometimes, but I always read to him.

While I was sitting next to him, yesterday he surprised me by reaching his right arm out to me, and I held his hand for a long time. I don’t know what he knew at that moment, but I know he knew his hand was being held. I saw him calm.

Carol’s great love for Ed is so visible every time she gets close to him. She is not repelled by him, by his wild eyes,by his looks or smells or sounds, by his dementia or confusion or frantic lashing. Her love for him is pure and undiminished.

In a sense, a disease like brain cancer is profoundly revealing. It tells all of us who we are and how we feel, it is ruthless and honest.

Carol always sees him as “My Farmer,”  no matter how sick he gets, or how he faces.

She kisses him on the forehead, talks to him, reads to him, scolds him a bit when he won’t eat, assures him he is going to a better place, tells him she loves him, rubs his arms to keep him warm, lets him know how the farm is doing, how the cows are, and the grandkids, she squeezes his hand, makes sure his sheets and blankets are covering him.

She never backs away from him, or is disturbed or disgusted by the things that happen to a man, even a strong one, who can’t go to the bathroom, or move himself, or swallow, or  sit up, or tell anyone how he feels or what he wants.

She reassures him now that he can go, that they all understand, they will all be okay, that he will see them all in  heaven, even the dogs and cows and bird and cats and goat.

Carol is convinced that Ed is hanging on waiting to hear everyone in his life tell him that he can go.

But I think Ed is hanging on because he is a strong man with a strong heart. It is not in our hands now, it is in the hands of Mother Nature, or if you prefer, God. I remember a hospice minister telling me that we cannot ever do God’s work, that is a burden to take off of the shoulders of the living. We must, he said,  leave to God what is his.

This love Carol has for Ed, day after day, is a great love. I know she cannot yet see through the sadness and the pain, but I believe one day she will, she is fortunate to know a great love like that. So am I, no matter what happens to me. That is something nothing, even death, can take away from me.

This kind of great love is l like the little tree that springs up on the side of a cliff, or under a concrete overpass. We can’t see it’s roots, or what it feeds on, or what miracle creates those green leaves. But it does exist and it really is green and somehow, it gets what it needs to survive.

I don’t ever tell Carol or her children what to feel as Ed gathers himself to die. I think that is God’s work, and I don’t even believe in the God they worship.

If they were to ask,  would tell them as I have written, that I hope they don’t forget to look beyond what is  sad, and see what can be beautiful about Ed’s death. It is them, and their love for him.

Carol’s great love for Ed is a beautiful thing to see.

It affirms my own sense of hope and affirmation for the best parts of being human, for the love that beats in the hearts of so many people, for the promise and potential of the human spirit.

Seeing this love, I can never despair about what it means to be human, or lose faith in the future.