Footfalls echo in the memory ..........

Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened
Into the rose-garden.  My words echo
Thus, in your mind.
                                    But to what purpose
Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves
I do not know.
                                     Other echoes
Inhabit the garden.  Shall we follow?

(From 'Burnt Norton', No 1 of  "Four Quartets" by T.S. Eliot, 1888-1965)

The memory of Akim's passing ( 37 years ago) lives on much longer than the life he was given (33 years)  as a beloved son, brother and uncle in AsH's family.

He would have been 70 two days ago and today on the first of May, I recall this song that he used to play at our Boon Lay flat.  "Guess who cried come first of May."

T.S. Eliot's 'Burnt Norton' started with ...

Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.

1949 - The baby of the family.

 .

'Time past' when there were four of us plus Abah and Mak ..... and later only Mak after December 1974.

'......... and what has been/ Point to one end, which is always present/ Footfalls echo in the memory.....'

Al Fatihah  Mustakim bin Abdul Hamid.

It has been 37 years and I miss you still.

The great business of life is to be, to do, to do without, and to depart. 
(John Morley, 1838-1923)