I have been well-acquainted with grief. As a Shiʿi Muslim, it permeates my religious consciousness and finds expression through annual mourning rituals. I find nourishment in mourning: from a young age I have lent my ears to lamentations and shed tears for martyrs felled in far-off lands.
Recently though, grief, paid a more personal visit when news reached me of my grandmother’s passing. In response, I turned to my favourite poem, Lord Tennyson’s In Memoriam A. H. H., which ranks among the most profound and poignant elegies ever penned, in any language.
