Poet Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer encourages us in her poem “On Thanksgiving” to notice the “hand open in grief, the other in gratitude…pressing them together to pray.”

The hand open in grief allows us to let go of the hard times while leaving room for the warmth of a hand offered to ease our pain. The hand open in gratitude encourages us to give from our overflow instead of letting fear make us grasp more tightly, afraid of not having enough.

Together, the open hands of grief and gratitude encourage us to keep moving, not get stuck, and use our open hands to grasp another’s gift of love, sympathy, generosity, strength, or courage.

Topics: Generosity, Gratitude, Power, Transformation, UU Values