#bereavement poems on Hello Poetry

Sarah Dec 2017

I woke up
a year ago today
innocent
unknowing
And went to bed
broken and heavy as stone.
They say that when
you lose someone
that day is forever
the end of your old life
and the beginning of the new one,
the life without.
Each day learning
how to cope with
the gaping hole
that was once filled with her.

#loss #grief #grieving #miss #you #missing #gone #bereavement #sad #heartbreak

verwandlung Dec 2017

An Octopus

lives in my gut,
but still I feel empty.

It's legs tangled
up inside me,
twisting my organs.

Its suckers squeeze
warmth out of me,
leaving me cold and numb.

Entwined inside,
suffocating
me as I try to breathe.

#grief #bereavement

verwandlung Dec 2017

For MJH

Music,
Dancing in the ears.
Trying to distract
From restless thoughts.

Music,
Hard to form, for now.
A wound to the heart,
Death an arrow.

Music,
Just reminds of them.
But slowly time heals
Its own harsh wounds.

about his experience of loss

#grief #bereavement

SabreLi Dec 2017

Francesca

There are so many things that I'd like to say
But I just can't find the words
And even if I could, there aren't enough hours in the day
For all that I want to be heard

It's impossible to condense into words on a page
Just how much you mean
No picture or verse could adequately gauge
All that could have been

I'll try my hardest to express
The joy you brought into our lives
All the love, hope and happiness
I just wish we had more time

But how could I fail to mention
Your beauty is exquisite
Button nose and rosy lips, you're the picture of perfection
And we're so grateful you came to visit

Named for elegance, sophistication and finesse
You're a beauty pure and rare
Spread your wings and reign on our princess
Beneath your crown of fair hair

I like to think you're sleeping, cosy and at ease
And though we'd much rather you were here
We'll take comfort in knowing that you're at peace
Treasured in our thoughts, you're always near

And though these times are painful and bittersweet
We will always remember
November 25th, two thousand and seventeen
When you touched our hearts forever

Copyright © 2017 SabreLi

Self explanatory :( <3

#sad #grief #loss #death #bereavement #sabreli #francesca

Nico Reznick Oct 2017

Seasons Of Loss

Somewhere along the line,
I lose track of the divide
between the
living and the dead.
In a thrift store, for
almost a minute, I
can't remember
whether or not
my parents are alive.
Staring at a china tea set
with a pattern of brown plums
I swear used to sit
in my grandmother's cabinet,
I can't place which
inevitable tragedies
are in the past, and
which are still ahead of me.

Summer ended
in a screech of brakes
one July night, and
October transitioned
prematurely into winter
with a flare of golden sunlight
and an overdose of anaesthetic.
There have been others - a long
succession of fatalities the
whole year through, but
those two were
the deaths that really
unmade me.
Since then, I guess,
the shadow has always
sort of been there.
Maybe before. Maybe
it started with that
first small, broken body.
Or else it's just getting older
and outliving friends
that does it.
Bereavement as the new normal.

Which leaves me here,
staring at thrift store china,
trying to remember
if I'm an orphan.

#death #bereavement #grief #mortality #humans #loss #memories

Shibu Varkey Oct 2017

My Father in Heaven

Your finger was good enough
For the first of my fledgling steps
As steady and firm I held
New step seemed easier than the first
Now your hand I see reach out
From beyond reality's veil
Gently on my shoulder placed
Nudging me on to those steps
You left me to walk by myself.

Your face was good enough
For first of my fumbling doubts
Each thought seemed clearer than the last.
Illumed by the faith in your face.
Your smile i see each starry night
Light setting my face aflame
Filling me,your spirit resolute
For each demon you left me to face.

Your breath was good enough
Felt it warm, so close to my face
My hurts and tears seemed naught
As its warmth breathed to my being life.
Your hug now I feel in the breeze.
Its gush telling me you are here.
Feeling the joy and the pain
That you left me here to gain.

For a special person who lent father to heaven

#dad #father #bereavement #demise #anniversary #memorial #love #joy

Tamal Kundu Oct 2017

The House at the End of the Street

Alone at last in the dead of night,

he reaches for her under their threadbare existence

with one clammy hand.

She dutifully obliges.

Alone at last in the dead of night,

the girl is sound asleep;

the tiara is still askew on her head

after the day’s rabid celebration.

Alone at the last at the dead of night,

the boy takes the unrelenting road

out of the town.

And towards new adventures.

Alone at last at the dead of night,

the dog sheds its skin

and howls at the moon.

#family #love #night #bereavement

Suzanne S Sep 2017

1 dead in mountaineering accident

We are lying together in a white room
Six arms, six legs, three hearts -all broken
And a magpie sits on the window ledge and screams
To the darkening sky,
We lie there together and listen as the world crumbles,
the sobbing not quite muffled by the walls
And know that this is the sound of a family shattering,
And your tears flow sticky and hot across your face
But this is sanctuary;
The only mountains our knees jutting up beneath the duvet
And we can wear the silence like armour, because what is anyone supposed to say,
In this bed you do not have to face the wall
Or think of what lies in wait outside the door
Or the sorrow of the magpie that calls it’s agony for you:
There is only us, and for a while that is enough.

To Cillian, a light extinguished.

#death #grief #bereavement #friendship #love

Melissa Sep 2017

Maybe I'll always wonder

I'll wonder if you miss us, that thought itself absurd

I'll wonder if the secrets I've told you since have been left unheard

I'll wonder if there is nothing, just blissful quiet sleep

I'll wonder if all your memories are still yours to keep

I'll wonder if I'll see you in more than just my dreams, that thought alone- sometimes- makes the pain less than it seems.

I wonder can you hear me, my laughter and my cries,

I wonder what happens when somebody dies.

#mum #mourning #bereavement #loss #atheism #agnostic #afterlife #cancer #sudden #thoughts

Nico Reznick Jul 2017

The Moirologists

We might
pretend to understand, but
we don't.
Perhaps it only
feels finite.
Perhaps we only mourn so well
because we look
so good in black.
Some days, that
horizon looks closer
than others, but
it's hard to say
what, if anything, that means.
Seven months could
be a whole lifetime.
You can turn
eighty years into
a false start or
an apology.

Still… it's not enough.
Nonetheless... that makes no difference.

Time and space and matter
continue to exist,
and the same senseless
tragedies repeat.
A pain that once
seemed strange
becomes cyclical and
intimately familiar.
These brutalising patterns.
These seasons of loss.
Winter in July.
Graves that can never be
deep enough.
I know you.
We've done this before.
This feeling is closer and
more known to me
than the calluses
on my palms
that have almost healed
somehow.
Fading stigmata.
Apostle of a
small slain god.

I'm not making sense, and I know
I'm not making sense,
but then nothing does.

#death #mortality #grief #bereavement #humans #grieving #loss #nihilism #philosophy