It was the little diamond Coronation Crown resting on the top of her coffin which spoke a parable plainly to me of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother. I could have touched it as it passed close to me in the Nave Aisle of Westminster Abbey last Tuesday.

Tiny, exquisite, delicately designed, with the great Koh-i-Noor Diamond as big as the face of a man's pcket watch sending flashes of colored light into the Abbey as it moved—it spoke to me of a brilliantly attractive, fascinating, tiny, exquisite woman bringing sunshine into a room with her smile. And behind the smile, the toughness of a disciplined life of service, a professionalism and a purpose in which wisdom and integrity of bronze were surrounded by laughter and kindness and tact and deep concern which her Christian faith had nourished for decades. For a century, no less . . . Her second motto could have been taken from the 119th Psalm, verse 112: “I have applied my heart to fulfill thy statutes alway; even unto the end.”

Queen Elizabeth deserved the singular title, Queen Mother. She was as I can attest extraordinarily motherly; grandmotherly.

She loved to eat outdoors. One June Sunday at Windsor in 1968, I was placed on her left whilst my employer, Michael, Archbishop of Canterbury, was on her right. She was talking to him when it was my turn to be served some delicious cold filet of beef in a jelly, crystal clear. I saw that Her Majesty had taken one slice. So I did the same. Suddenly she turned and said as she saw what was on my plate: “What’s the matter? Don’t you like it?” “Ma’am, I looked to se how much your Majesty had taken; I didn’t want to be greedy . . . .” The footman with the tray returned at her call. “Let’s have a look at this,” and taking the spoon and fork she helped herself to two more slices, and she put them on my plate. “Eat it up. It will do you good . . . .”

The sunshine I knew was the autumn sunshine forty years ago. Not the early summer sunshine of her Coronation in 1937. Not the powerful sunshine of courageous leadership in World War II, where her husband the King had shouldered a staggering burden and she was there to share that burden with courage and stoutness of heart. But the autumn sunshine of a long widowhood bravely faced and gracefully borne; a golden sunshine, if you like. And people’s faces with her reflected it.

In the sunshine of autumn she exuded vitality and energy. After a long and hilarious lunch in the early eighties when all I wanted to do was to take a nap, she took leave of us as she mounted the stairs to change for a late afternoon engagement. Her beloved Lady in Waiting, Ruth, Lady Fermoy, whispered to me as she began to follow Her Majesty up the stairs, “She’ll kill us all! She’ll kill us all!”

She almost did. Her optimism outran most of ous. Her charity exhausted most of ours. Don’t for a moment believe the tales of her undying hatred of Wallis Duchess of Windsor. I know the priest who regularly and not infrequently was asked by her privately to travel to Paris just to check up on the old and failing couple. And flowers would always be sent when Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother paid her annual visits to places in France and Europe. Time cannot heal all wounds, but wisdom and perspective are a good ointment for hurts sustained long ago. She would echo the Psalmist (119: v. 54): “Thy statutes have been my songs, in the house of my pilgrimage.”

This is no time for sadness. She died in her sleep, and her exquisite sense of timing never left her. Imagine! Falling asleep in the Lord on Easter Eve and waking to the Eternal Easter!

Typical again of her indomitable spirit is the poem Her Majesty had included within the covers of the Funeral Service leaflet. Listen:

You can shed tears that she is gone or you can smile because she has lived. You can close your eyes and pray that she’ll come back or you can open your eyes and see all she’s left. Your heart can be empty because you can’t see her or you can be full of the love you shared. You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday or you can be happy for tomorrow because of yesterday. You can remember her and only that she’s gone or you can cherish her memory and let it live on. You can cry and close your mind, be empty and turn your back or you can do what she’d want: smile, open your eyes, love and go on.

(Author unknown)

Her autumnal sunshine brought a golden glow to the causes blessed with her concern and her indefatigable capacity for friendship and encouragement. God grant her the full sunshine of his face as he welcomes her, ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven, into his presence with all those she loved, and lost awhile.