Of Spring-Kissed Dells and Lily Ponds, in Grief, Gratitude, and Love (Strauss, York Bowen, Eden Ahbez, Brahms, Mozart)

On the fictional side of the fourth wall, I have been on an endless walk in which I cannot seem to ever sit down and be bothered to sit down and eat lunch ... I too live the life of the soul and spirit not troubled with such needs ... although having said that, the risk of being fussed at about that by a certain spectral basso profondo who insists I maintain good habits on both sides of the wall will exist whenever he comes down from getting invited to be on the non-fiction side of the fourth wall in the most unlikely circumstance.

I had minor surgery last week -- surprise, even to me! -- and wouldn't you know as they were doing the sedation things they asked me:

"Who is your favorite singer?"

I never hesitated.

"Kurt Möll."

And thus he claimed new fans and joined my pain management team on the non-fiction side of the fourth wall ... his joyful singing filled that operating room and started me to dreamland in style ... the Knockout Zone became a known thing in the medical world!

Of course I could was happy to get back to the fictional side of the fourth wall to watch the Ghost of Musical Greatness Past live his best Old Blush life ...

"Frau Mathews ... that going into surgery, you thought I could do all that not just for you, but for everyone who had your care ... ."

"I did not think, or even believe. I knew."

Then I found out ... I had been right ... subconsciously, he was indeed reprising something of the role of Admiral Morosus, although I was hardly a Timidia type from Strauss's 'Die Schweigsame Frau' ... for he sang out the very lines and hit that booming high note, and I was not ready!

"I thank you ... oh, a blessed flower is blooming in my heart ... of joy!"

(The timestamp is 13:35 to 17:44)

In that scene, the admiral shows his true character, knowing in his heart that he is not the right match for young Timidia and willing to give her up so that she can be happy ... he still does have love, true love within his heart, not unlike King Marke in Wagner. Yet unlike Isolde, she states her willingness to learn to love him, and his gratitude takes him to being overjoyed and ready to live in that gratitude and love for her. Now of course, the admiral's nephew is doing a complex comedic intervention to cure his uncle of his grumbling discontent, and all is well that ends well for everyone involved. The admiral, in finding that life still offers him much cause for joy and gratitude, and realizing he does have love within him to meet that of everyone around him, is indeed healed by that.

But, assume a reaction like that in someone whose joy turned even his villain roles into comic relief, who did not need an elaborate setup to remember love and gratitude and to get into that cycle that can lift a heart into sheer bliss ... that high note opened the Knockout Zone up in broad daylight, for autumn and spring suddenly decided winter was merely an embrace for them ...

... and so bright was the blue above the spring-kissed bushes that it seemed the stars of the midnight were twinkling in every rain-polished opening between leaves, unable to withhold their light from the midday because the midnight was too overjoyed ...

... and the only reason I was not straight passed out on the pavement was because he had gathered me up, with the utmost tenderness ...

"Oh no, meine liebe Dame, mein geliebtes Blumenkind ... this cold ground shall not claim you... not on my watch ... in mein Armen, schlafen!"

But then at some point, the dream ended ... because, at last ...

"Wait a minute," he said, and then found a seat and sat down with me, because the thought had literally staggered him. "Wait just a minute ... how are we out here walking already?

"Timidia I am not," I said sweetly as I opened my eyes, and he broke out laughing. "I did take multiple days off in bed, but I needed fresh air on a day not too cool, not too breezy, not too hot ... this was ideal."

"You do not lack for courage and determination, Frau Mathews. It is just a few steps from the bus stop to the Fuchsia Dell."

"And there are plenty of places to sit, and I thought I would just walk downhill and over to the Lily Pond and see if it were cleaned up ... ."

His expression was a whole five-act opera ... disbelief, confusion, dismay, understanding, tenderness ... and since he was quoting lines from 'Death and the Maiden' over me falling right into the Knockout Zone and into his arms, he just kept on, in English.

"'I do not scold you; I am your friend.' I respect the fact that you need what you need, Frau Mathews."

I almost went right back to the Knockout Zone from relief.

"I know that today is the 87th anniversary of the birth of Linda Anne Kotcher, your beloved piano teacher, and you are having anniversary stress. You deal with grief by walking through it, but she would not have you come to grief, in the process. You found consolation in my legacy for her loss, so indeed we have gone a full circle since 2023. Since you have re-materialized me for Q-Inspired, and I am therefore literally here, I would wish that you would continue to lean upon my arm as we walk, so that I may lend you my far greater strength."

"It is agreeable ... and I thank you!" I cried.

He took out his ethereal handkerchief, seeing I was on the verge of tears.

"You are entitled to all of your feelings today, Frau Mathews, as on every day."

He paused, and then smiled gently.

"On my little computer in my apartment in the city, I was on YouTube this morning while preparing to meet you here, and found a beautiful piece of music by York Bowen that I thought you might enjoy ... it is about a sunset in autumn from a great but serious vista, with all the mingled thoughts of glorious beauty and the coming also of night such a scene might also evoke."

"York Bowen is new to me," I said, "but I am willing to learn."

"I present you 'Picture from a Fortress Wall,' for your listening enjoyment."

Indeed this poignantly beautiful piece tapped the floodgates of my heart ... so many memories wrapped in love and grief ... it was like Mr. Bowen had written it all out in beauty, like Beethoven had once consoled a friend in tones ... so I wept heavily, and had deep relief then at last.

The great ethereal opera singer was completely silent, in a show of humility that staggered me to consider ... though he might sing me out of pain at will, he did indeed respect that I needed what I needed. This was another deep show of love, and another lesson. He did not say a word more, but waited until I was very calm, and then rose and offered me his hand, and then his arm, and off we went through the spring-kissed Fuchsia Dell.

I soon realized: although he was in appearance around 55-60, he certainly was getting all the advantage of coming up soon on the 87th anniversary of his birth ... he was pacing me in sedate octogenarian style! But I was content and so was he, and I soon noticed that even in perfect quiet, he was slowly but steadily glowing up ...

"You are easy to please," I teased, and he laughed ... but that laugh, and the timbre of his voice, told me where he, and thus we, were going...

"I freely confess to you that you have completed my joys this day, Frau Mathews, in walking at this sedate octogenarian pace that is safe for both of us ... all that week, and all this week, you have yielded to love ... you reached out to those who have stepped up for you, and let them show their love and cover you and care for you ... you trusted in others to handle their own business and did not lean into that subtle pride that would have over-driven you, and so gave them more room to grow. You chose humility, and in doing so, loved others even as they were able to love you. You made so much more room for love in your life, all the way around ... and least of all, you included this little old bass, and wanted him on both sides of the fourth wall to go through with you ... you leaned upon my voice as you are now leaning upon my arm.

"I am so glad ... I am so relieved ... I am so grateful that you have learned to be loved, this precious lesson that will carry you throughout your life and your eternity ...

" ... and thus I have also seen the promises made to me, in being assigned this mission with you, being fulfilled before my eyes. I have been and I will be expressing myself on high in a manner this earth cannot withstand about this ... but here I also must be disciplined as you must, and pace myself. Indeed, we will get to the top of the hill ...

" ... yet I also must pace myself today. I am still finite, though no longer mortal, and I have limits beyond which it is not safe for me to go while here with you."

"I love that you are not a hypocrite," I said.

"I could not stand in your presence if I were. Your standards are too high, and surely I am no better and stronger a man, nor less impressed with the gravity of my stewardship, than your grand old soldier ... for what is it that he said to you while you were resting at home this week when he called?"

"He told me that it was not that I was so beautiful that he loved me, although I am ... but for my heart, full of love, not only to him, but to everyone to whom we had been called, and that he had been so glad to have been called with me, even though ..."

Even though, like Marke and Morosus, he had to let me go. He was not up enough on opera to know that exactly, but like I had been told the previous week, I heard those two characters, and their finest interpreter in the second half of the 20th century, because of my grand old soldier ... who, though in failing health himself, still always reached out to show his love for me, which I still returned while in the long process of letting him go as he prepared to take that bass seat on high ...

Now between that and it being Ms. Kotcher's birthday ... one gone, one leaving me ... yes, I was seeking my places of refuge ...

... just doing what I knew to do, walking through ... but I also realized things were different ... I did not have to push myself too far ... love was willing to carry me ... I could rest ... I could physically take the time I needed to heal ... I could take the time I needed to walk through with my grand old soldier to the end of his mortal life and the beginning of his immortal life, and to grieve and mourn after that ... and if one or both would prove too much, then love was willing to carry me to its own eternal domains to rest. To walk as I was called, to abide, to adorn, to appear, to appropriate all that was in my calling -- and that last part including appropriating the necessary rest, trusting that love and grace would carry me in that rest -- it was a deep lesson to consider, and on time.

My companion, ever mindful of his stewardship and seeing that I again was weeping, picked me up and carried me into the shade of spring's herald there...

... and then gently gave advanced welcome to spring to San Francisco ... the joy of "Das Tal," of a man coming home to his beloved valley in spring and there finding all in the world that he needs until his days on earth end. The character has known pain, and will know it again ... but he knows that in coming home to what he has been called to, he will be blessed and even leave a blessing behind him.

I just leaned in ... I understood the lesson ... it had taken ten months, but love is patient, and love is kind ... it will not force its way, but will reveal its power as the beloved is ready to receive it. Love, overjoyed, and singing over the beloved at rest ... in times past I would never have sat still long enough ... but I was ready, now.

It also occurred to me why things go so spectacularly wrong in the companion song to "Das Tal." In "Das Tal," the character meets the end of his days and leaves a legacy of blessing ... he leaves his body to nourish the spring that blooms right on ... nimm mir auf is the same phrase in both songs, and it would roughly translate to "take me up" ... when one can carry one's self no further, one must rest ... and in "Das Tal," that is a blessing continuing, as love and joy and gratitude bloom right on with the spring.

Not so in "Der Einsame," in which the character has locked all his hope and love into a single mortal woman whose love he loses. This plunges him into -- or returns him? -- to a darkness that is strangling him alive. When the abyss -- eternal night -- opens literally at his feet, he walks in with the same words: "Take me up!" This too is a rest ... a rest from all but the consciousness of eternal darkness, with no blessing ahead or behind it!

Now, I was not about to ask for "Der Einsame" to be sung at this beautiful moment, with this serene scene before us, as spring's heralds dotted the meadow and Sutro Tower stood in the distance ...

... but I realized that perhaps walking into the understandings provided by "Das Tal" was how one evaded the consequences of "Der Einsame" ... perhaps that was the only way. I know what grief is to me, how devastatingly painful it is ... had I in 2022 and 2023 not known that I dare not repose all hope of love and life in any mortal or any set of mortals, the call of the abyss might have proved too much to resist ... so I climbed. There literally had been that one night in October 2023 ... and physically, I scaled Buena Vista Hill to the top on its western approach, literally removing my foot from that place and to the highest sunshine in walking distance ...

But to find what? Now I remembered ... I made friends on that hill that year, and saw vistas of beauty that I hardly would have imagined were so close to my door ... and took refuge and rest there from feeling the need to respond to betrayal ... and there, most often alone, ran right into Love Infinite, embracing my broken heart ... He Who called me there met me there ... there had been such moments of relief and praise and worship on that hill! There, having walked up into love's embrace, and such companions suitable to it, was where I was made ready to produce my fifth book, published in that same October 2023.

While I was thinking of all this, the big bass echo of all that love had stood a little distant from me, for his voice was immense, but not too far, or too loud ... he stayed under the traffic dampening from Kezar Crossover nearby in volume, for this was for me as he became even more overjoyed upon sensing that I was gaining more understanding. He did look up, in character, at the great verdant hill and its early blooming, and opened his arms ... but there was no missing when he lowered his head and looked at me at the final height of the song...

"Take me up, and bloom right on!"

The look of blazing joy upon his face, softening to such deep tenderness ... how love triumphed in being permitted to reveal more of itself for the beloved, and how willing it was to do that ... that was a revelation ... and also told me something more about my grand old soldier, who had sacrificed his own desire for me while still loving me, so I could bloom right on. He did not regret it, for he knew: thus he had been called, and he was satisfied with that.

Ms. Kotcher ... she knew that I was her heir, and that I would continue her work to the next generation ... and I had, to two more, though I was yet only 44. What had I done to honor her? I had bloomed right on, and nurtured others ... and how was I already honoring my grand old soldier, who was living to witness all this -- would I stop when he passed, choosing despair?

No. I would do what he had sacrificed so much for me to do: I would bloom right on, as long as I was called to do so. For what had I climbed to a new way of living, if not to do that?

This indeed was a full circle ... it had been in the first lessons in 2023 since I had so much grief still to go through all around ... but that being done, life's inevitable natural griefs and struggles were still going to impact me, and this was a beautiful, loving reprise of the answer: walk on by faith, with the addendum that at times when one needed to rest, love and grace fully accounted for that also.

"And to that end you also came to know me, and my legacy of love -- bloom right on, Frau Mathews, and if this little old bass can help you, you know I always will!"

"Yes, I know ... I thank you!"

He came back and sat down by me, and smiled as he offered me his handkerchief yet again, but now, for my tears of joy.

Meanwhile, another of the park shuttles went by, going to its turnaround spot. It would return to the nearest stop to us in ten minutes, and had a stop just across from the Tree Fern Dell. This fact had already been noticed by my companion, who did a hilarious moving imitation of a ritardando from andante -- walking speed -- as we approached that stop.

"Only a good musician would know what you just did, Herr Meistersänger!" I said, and laughed in the warmth of his smile until the shuttle arrived.

As it often was in the winter at that time of day, the shuttle was empty except for us and the driver, so ...

"My good man, I ask a favor ... my darling here is taking her first day out after surgery ... if you will not be harmed in your schedule, I would appreciate the most gentle pace you can drive."

He already had a sizable tip in his hand, so his request was gladly granted!

"Thank you so much, my good man," he said as the driver practically pulled into the dell and let down the handicap ramp so I would have a smooth walk down. "If only I knew your schedule -- I would look to ride with you!"

That man volunteered his entire schedule both for the park and everywhere else he drove in the city!

"A big tip, a big bass voice, and a smile can get you just about anything in this world," I teased as the shuttle drove away.

"Well, you know a man has to work with what he has," the possessor of that big bass voice purred demurely, and had me laughing again as we walked into the quiet of the Tree Fern Dell in winter...

... and feasted our eyes on some golden-eyed burgundy heralds of spring ...

... before at last he shared his thoughts from ten minutes before.

"I thank you," he said, "for letting me rescue my money before my pockets burned a hole in it, which is also to say that I thank you for being willing to just wait with me for the shuttle."

"Well, I did think we could have walked up here faster, but then I thought, you are loving me well. Why would I disturb that, at risk to myself, when I could instead thank you in word and deed?"

This was a winter reprise of the lesson of July ... of not going up a hill when I knew my strength was not sufficient after Covid-19 to do it safely ... of not sinning against the grace that had brought me safe thus far ... but this was a step further ... a baby step, perhaps, but still ... for after walking, abiding, adorning, appearing, then had come associating late in 2024, appropriating in 2025, and then perhaps ... affirming?

Yes. That was it. He glowed up so high ... his eyes blazed so ...

"Oh, you are learning now and about to learn some more," he said. "I held myself back earlier, and I have paced myself to be ready for you affirming me in my love for you in your sweet voice, looking up at me with your two deep eyes ..."

That reference to two deep eyes ... "Versunken" in Brahms ... occupational hazard of walking by lakes in parks with the type of man who opened his whole collection of Brahms' lieder talking about how he had heard about a pool deeper than the sea in the woods, and boldly gone to find out! He found out, in the form of two deep eyes that have him falling headlong into the waves of love and sinking! The song opens and closes with the declaration: "The waves of love roar around my heart"!

Now, it was important to first find out that the gardeners of Golden Gate Park had done a magnificent job preparing the Lily Pond for spring --

-- for that clear water suddenly had the Pacific for depth underneath it, and as his arms went around me so did our exploring bubble.

"I was just trying to get a walk around the Lily Pond in," I said, "but I am not opposed to a tour of the wonders of the Pacific coastline. Thank you for the additional blessing."

So off we went, far past the bottom of the pond ... in and out of the great kelp forests with all their colorful creatures ... deeper still, seeing the rainbow of inflorescent life that carried its light with it at such depths ... deeper still, but because in love, the ceiling of the Knockout Zone was serving as the unfathomable bottom, fiery auroras in every color of the rainbow breaking out over the night sky, and there he sang out all his heart, of course, in Brahms's "Versunken" that already, complete with rainbows in the deep, was being visually represented ...

It is the first song in this collection -- and what an opener!

To think that being affirmed in love, and thus knowing he was loved in return, could make anyone so happy ... it was a bright vision of a reality that I had only dimly glimpsed in previous decades of my life. Now Nat King Cole had explained what songwriter Eden Ahbez had to teach about the greatest thing we'll ever learn ...

... but the nexus of where those two realities met was still new territory to me to consciously consider, even though in my devotional life and family life and with my grand old soldier I had experienced this. To love ... to learn how to be loved... to love back through affirmation in both deed and word ... to be loved still more ... to love back still more through affirmation in both deed and word ... and so forth ... another way of thinking of it in infinite terms would be to say to have love moving freely between two or more people, the flow becoming greater and greater as each acted in accord with it and affirmed each other in doing so ... and this was not even considering pure gratitude thrown into the mix...

"How lovely, all of this that you did not have to do for me ... I thank you ... danke schön!"

From beneath us -- or above us -- it was getting hard to tell -- a golden shower of bubbles began to surround us, and out of that, that voice, ringing like great golden bells tuned for depth, at last passed the verge of ecstasy in its utter rejoicing.

"You are so welcome ... so welcome ... I thank you ... I thank you ... you have my eternal gratitude ... oh, that you have trusted me to show you the side of being loved, and opened the way for me to show you even more of its infinite depths ... ach, meine liebe Dame, mein goldenes, geliebtes Blumenkind ... ich danke dir ... ich danke dir ... !"

His German got past me at that point, for he was by no means calming down! He had once described to me how he was pressed: the love back of him for me was so very great, in addition to his personal affection for me and the effects of my responses upon him ... all he wanted was more room, and for the moment, the whole Pacific was the stage!

So many people living in the world are just the opposite ... so much resentment and hatred ... it burns them up from the inside out, no matter how much room they are given to be cruel to others. It is the depth of Strauss's abyss in "Der Einsame," considered as the anteroom to Mozart's hell in Don Giovanni.

But then, considering the potential of "Versunken" and "Das Tal" inside "Nature Boy," with perhaps the thought of Bruckner and Bach dropping in a Benedictus or two -- the grant of a blessing from One with the ultimate power to do that -- it would be the opposite kind of life and eternity of blessing, in holy passion that need not be denied. This was still the case with my grand old soldier, still working on plans to bless me and others on the way out of this world, for that was who he was ... and why, knowing my heart was like his, that he loved me.

Meanwhile, it was a good thing that golden bubbles have a dampening effect, because the bass with me in the bubble was still mightily rejoicing, having gone from thanking me to addressing his thanks on high for being assigned to love me. I'm sure the U.S. Navy was probably getting sonar readings that made no sense, not being set up for ethereal opera singers just lost in the depths of love and gratitude and praise...

But then, the bubble containing us popped up through the aerating fountain in the eastern side of the Lily Pond! The gold had come through because the sun was shining at the lake in sudden, dazzling brightness!

Safely to shore in a moment so beautiful that it was no hardship of loss of beauty to see it in winter glory, its baby lily pads beginning to grow ...

... and to a lovely seat.

There our little exploring bubble let us gently down, and there we were, again in the deep, gentle quiet. He still had not calmed down, but had been disoriented just enough ...

"Ach ... wo bin ich?" he said.

"Rest with me a while here, again at the Lily Pond," I said gently. "You have been here, the depths of the sea, the throne room on high, and back, in your dear heart and mind -- rest with me here a little while. It is your turn."

His eyes lit up, for he understood how I was mirroring his gentle treatment of me, and likewise did not complain, but yielded with a smile and settled back, closing his hand so I could pretend to in any way cover it with mine! He was far too large for me to do the kind of total embrace he could do for me, but I wrapped my voice around him, humming to him "Wie schön doch die Musik" from Strauss, in which Admiral Morosus goes to sweet sleep ... and that was plenty. He soon was as close to deeply asleep as an ethereal bass could be, calm and completely relaxed. I enjoyed watching the fountain in the pond until my eyes also closed in complete contentment. A great weight had come off my heart because of what I had seen and learned.

Now when I sleep, I actually do, and it is still winter: the days get right on. So I was not entirely surprised to begin to wake while likewise "floating" ... being carried down from the Lily Pond, back through the Tree Fern Dell to the shuttle stop, my ears being caressed by a very deep voice humming quite far up in its range ... was that indeed "Dalla sua pace" from Mozart? No, of course not ... that was a tenor aria ... definitely right for his colleague, wonderful tenor Jerry Hadley in that same 1990 performance at the Met, who did a marvelous job with Don Ottavio declaring the devotion of his love for Donna Anna, and his willingness to do anything and everything for her happiness. Not anywhere in range for Commendatore ... wrong role, wrong voice type ...

... until one remembers that that Donna Anna is the Commendatore's daughter, whom he loves so deeply that he lays down his life to defend her ... and somewhere in the deep background, one likes to think he must have loved her mother, just because the same character comes on a mission of mercy even to his murderer.

But no ... of course not ... not our sedate octogenarian bass from the great beyond, getting that far out of his lane, never mind that he could and did reach high Gs in full voice, and certainly could croon one in his immense falsetto whenever he wanted since that went at least up to high B flat ... but oh no ... of course not ... I was still asleep ... had to be ... which is why of course what he said as he gently put me down on the bench by the road went into English translation without me even trying...

"Ich bin bereit ... I am willing ... I am willing to be pressed even thus far ... there will be no hardship worth my consideration for me in any task You require henceforth ... I am willing ... whatever You would have me do for this our beloved one, I am willing."

Now the last time he had said that, he had been fitted with a marble suit heated to cracking, so that I could see what was going to happen to me if I kept trying to wrestle with people on the brink of the pit when they really wanted to go there ... I got the message!

But the other side of the message ... this was the type of man, like my grand old soldier, who would stop at nothing within the realm of what was divinely permitted for the sake of love. He had played all those roles of mature men on journeys into great, deep love, and left a legacy that reflected that indeed he was that kind of man ... and that was, indeed, why he stood out to me ... he reflected the journey of my grand old soldier ... and also, he might also be a beacon of a future love ... I was at least healed enough to consider the possibility.

But not too much consideration yet ... there were some things I was not ready for in full consciousness. Nonetheless, life was moving right on ...

"Ah, my good master of the shuttle -- you are right on time!"

"Of course, sir ... oh, thank you! ... let me pull right up in there and let the ramp down for you!"

"You know," I purred softly after we were on our way, "I'm not really used to this whole 'being treated like plate glass' regime, but ... ."

He laughed, and then set himself in his seat quite deliberately -- there was one more high note to go ...

"Plate glass? No glass has the delicacy of mein Blumenkind, who must grow and heal and be well! What a silly dream you are reporting to me! Plate glass? HA!"

That was the high G, famously heard live on stage a few times -- I had not been dreaming after all ... but then I caught his reflection in the glass a little afterward ... the sun had caught my eye and I was looking out, but as we passed a tree the inside of the shuttle was again reflected, and I saw that the golden light gone forever from the despairing character in Strauss's "Der Einsame" was shining brightly in the eyes of the gentleman sitting next to me, so brightly that even in reflection it picked up along with the sweetness of his smile.

"Danke schön," I purred. "Thank you for going with me to the Lily Pond, and all the rest, too!"

"Bitte schön," he purred back, and said no more all the way to my door.

I at last went back to work on Friday ... and on my desk, I found a beautiful blue scarf, and wrapped in it, this ...

... with a note, the English handwriting notably inflected by World War II-era German cursive:

"In all deep matters, it is of course understood: delayed is not necessarily denied."

February 28, of course, is exactly two weeks late, but accounting for the intellect at hand, strategically late ...

"Folks -- you gotta come to the boardroom!" another co-worker said. "Somebody is making up for missing Valentine's Day and I hope the apology is accepted because -- you gotta see it!"

White calla lilies and blue delphiniums with green ferns, wrapped in silver paper with golden glitter ... someone was singing his heart out in the language of flowers and color ... and I knew that somewhere in the park, the fans of K.M. Altesrouge were being shocked and awed ... delayed, but not denied.

All I could do, as Admiral Morosus had said it in Strauss, was to be grateful.