Hades in the sky: a search for a place to mourn in times of apocalypse
’Lamentation names what is wrong, what is out of order in God’s world, what keeps human beings from thriving in all their creative potential. Simple acts of lament expose these conditions, name them, open them to grief and anger and make them visible for remedy.
In its complaint and anger and grief, lamentation protests conditions that prevent human thriving and this resistance may finally prepare the way for healing.’
— Kathleen O’Connor
It was Christmas Eve. I had just spent five days in Amsterdam with friends and family, six months after our move to Sweden. In an attempt to find some stillness, I picked up my phone to check the news. “Moon to become graveyard for old satellites: 'Most practical solution’,” headlined a Dutch news site.
I hear no one talking about it. The message seems to come to our attention as quietly as thieves in the night. Once inside me, however, they turned everything upside down. I ran outside and looked at the moon. It was a clear night. I didn’t know whether to cry or to scream.
If only I had someone to be angry at. But who is this faceless entity that decides this virgin celestial body—which for thousands of years has been a symbol of femininity, religion, and reflection; that moves seas and oceans; whose reflected light guides animals through the night; the mirror in which women see their monthly cycles reflected—that she may become a graveyard for the shadow of our modern society?
And if I were to cry, who would hear my tears, and what difference would it make?
In leadership programs, I learned that I shouldn’t worry about things I cannot influence. But in a time where the legacy of progress is becoming increasingly visible, this seems nearly impossible. Unless I become a robot.
Earlier this year, I learned about an ancient tradition called lament. It is a word seldom used in my native language. I learned that lament is a musical expression, carried by emotion—a combination of melody, poetry, and natural tears. According to grief worker Alexandra Derwen, it is essential in times of great transition to make space for the grief we encounter; ‘Unmourned grief will destroy us all’.
It felt like familiar territory. During the years when Long Covid had dragged me into my own underworld, music—putting into words the deep sense of loss for a certain future—had been my sanctuary. It was the rope I used to descend into the place of mourning, and by which I could safely return when it was time.
I took my chance and began to enter the terrain of lament. Over several weeks, I recorded images and sounds of what I encountered in daily life that made me feel connected to the powerlessness, anger, and sadness of this situation, where Hades had just expanded his domain to the moon.
It wasn't easy, because daily life seemed to constantly stand in the way of this project. The renovation of our house was delayed by a month, meaning that in a new country, with two young children and an eight-week-old puppy, we had to pack our things every week and find new accommodation. Meanwhile, I was giving a workshop on the myth of Persephone and trying to set up my practice as a psychologist. My thoughts about this situation were so oppressive. Not only did I feel like an inadequate mother, I felt snowed under and unable to connect with my creativity and authenticity.
A familiar theme for me. In my life before Long Covid, when I worked at a bank, I had felt unable to bring in my own authentic voice. It felt as though I lived in two separate worlds, with a burning desire to bring them together.
One day, amidst the moving boxes, I decided to pull the piano out of its plastic wrapping, strike the first notes, and carefully let my voice connect with my grief and powerlessness. The moon, my life.
As I looked up images of the staggering number of satellites currently swarming around the earth, it dawned on me: I am the earth with the satellites, and I am that which longs for the virginity of the moon. I am modern society with its craving for perfectionism and progress, and I am the soul that suffers beneath it.
And the most agonising part: I have no solution for this.
I listened to a podcast about lament and heard the quote by Kathleen O’Connor that stands at the top of this introduction. It dawned on me that lament is not about finding a solution. It doesn’t require the perfect words that bring relief like a hero’s elixir. For me, the twilight of the moonlight exposed exactly what is wrong, and how painful and oppressive that is.
The lament became my testament to this. I invite you to listen, and so to bear witness together. To ‘the siren of the violence of duality and her lullaby,’ as Derwen puts it.
Click here to witness my lament: Hades in the Sky
