Emma Smith, c. 1875
My Heart Goes Out
The photograph above was recently found of Emma Smith in the last years of her life. Note her dead eyes. Other photographs of around the same time show it more strikingly. Her letters to Joseph years before show a woman full of passion and love of life. Her entire life was one of service and kindness. But by the end, her eyes were full of sadness and grief.
I feel Emma Smith's pain more than most. To those who haven't heard of her, she was the widow of the Prophet Joseph Smith, first prophet of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, aka the LDS church. She held and buried six babies, one of them adopted, plus one adult child. There is no way to know how many she may have miscarried. She suffered through legal injustices, hellish persecutions, a cheating second husband after Joseph died, and more trauma than most of us can imagine. I have not undergone near what she did. But we have lost 15 babies in a row. I will have to describe it in more detail at some point, but we have been falsely accused and dealt with legal troubles. I have lived through more hell than many but less than many others. I know how fundamentally trauma changes one.
But I also know there's hope. I know there's love before, during, and especially after grief. My husband and older children have supported me. My Father in Heaven hasn't forsaken me. And He will love and support all of His children if we reach out to Him even as we go through our deepest levels of hell.
Here is a poem I wrote just over three years ago when I was writing a piece about what Emma must have suffered the day she found out about Joseph's death.
"Hope's Eyes"
My eyes, like Emma’s,
Ache with stinging tears shed
And squeezed inside
For babies--now angels--
Hollow arms cannot hold.
The heart leaks,
Holding back a soul’s flood.
Words of comfort
Only bring to mind
Warm, tender skin
And wide, blue eyes
Now leaden
Under frozen earth.
Only the promise, the hope
Of cold flesh becoming warm again,
Can help me see the sunshine.
Only the dream
Of toothless smiles and blue eyes
Reviving on a day when the Son
Rises again
Make breath come at all.
My Hope
I know I will hold my baby, in fact all my babies, again. This knowledge is what makes it possible to keep my eyes and my smile alive. Both eyes and smile died for a while, but they're restored. That doesn't mean I don't cry, don't ache. But I will survive it with the hope, the knowledge, that I will hold my babies again when Jesus Christ returns.
