dcseain | Sailing the Sunless Sea - Rquest for Editing Help

Sailing the Sunless Sea is the theme for this year's Samhain service at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Silver Spring. I'm one of the presenters of the service, and my primary job is the opening words. Sailing the Sunless Sea is the primary theme, with a leitmotif of breath/breathing. So, my keywords for writing were:

Grim
Breath
Sea
Water
Salt
Tears

The proposed text:

We know someone has died ~~because~~when they stop breathing; the chest falls but does not rise again. The last breath is the one with which the soul leaves the body, blessed by the salty water of tears shed by those in witness, and by those who later mourn.

The water and salt and sorrow of those tears help fill a sunless sea beyond the veil in which ~~lay~~lies an island; a liminal place neither in the here, nor in the beyond. An island of apple trees perpetually in bloom and perpetually bearing fruit so that ~~none~~no one ever hungers, nor wants for beauty. According to the Britannic tradition, it is to that island that souls go when they pass. Call it Apple Island, The Land Beyond the Veil, The Misty Isle, Avalon, Annwyn, or what you will. Know that it is there for you to breathe its fruity goodness, amid the isolation of the great Sunless Sea.

Last year at this Samhain ceremony I spoke to you of the origins of pumpkin carving, the sharing of food and the thinning of the veil between the worlds which allows the dearly departed ancestors, the wee folk, and the yet to be born to roam among us at this holy and sacred time of year.

Holy because this is a time for looking back; for remembering; for acknowledging those who have passed while being thankful for the breath we draw, and the memories we carry. A time to embrace life joyously while yet we mourn those we have lost.

Sacred because Samhain is liminal – a space between the physical and the ethereal; a time between death and birth; a place between the here and the beyond, as the beach between the land and the sea.

Breathe deeply and join us in honouring those who have died before us.