I have returned to Menya's website and this bulletin board for the first time since leaving a posting a week after her death. Morris has just sent us a copy of his eloquent and moving account of her dying, along with a spectacular banner made by her aunt from Menya's robes and jewelery. Although her memory has been with me constantly, the book made her smile shine again and her voice ring in my ears and I had to come back to share with the community of Menyans.

I could not share directly in Menya's care, or bear witness to her courage over those last months. We were far apart in distance, but never far in thought then. Reading of the final days was a wonderful albeit painful experience, and I am reminded of the text: "O Death, where is thy sting, O grave, where is thy victory?"

A long time ago I remember reading that one of the invocations the ancient Egyptians made in their elaborate funerary rites was a call to "make the name of the dead live again". Morris, your book has made Menya live again - all the joy and all the beauty and yes all the pain that are part of my memories of her. I am crying as I try to type this, as I have not done since learning of her death. Menya, your name lives on and ever will as long as I continue.

"For now we see as through a glass, darkly - but then, face to face".