I can’t tell you how much I miss her
or I might begin to cry
it may just be the idea of her
and my memory is a lie
either way, there is a deep-rooted longing
the need for companionship and belonging
someone to share my love and passion
feel free to call me old fashioned
but I miss her whoever she was or could be
her that fulfilled all my needs
where have you gone the love of my life
I know the answer I know that you died
tell me how I fill that void
that hole where a heart once sat
now those feelings I try to avoid
now I only deal in facts
the fact is I talk to strangers
about everything but love
how can I tell them how much I crave her
about what really is and was
now I use my body to numb the pain
so many strangers
so many forgotten names
I can’t name her
or remember her voice
I can’t even say she loved me back
or that she really had a choice
so please please cut me some slack
if I step out of line
and if I look a little down
please ask again if I say I’m fine.

I found you when I was lost
Both of us young and full of fire
Not knowing what it meant to love
We were found in the wrong time

I found you when I was lost
Scared and alone trying to navigate change
Powerfully emotional and dangerous
We found pain

I found you when I was lost
Far to young for how deeply we loved
Gentle souls that didn’t know how to live
Then we found change

I found you when I was lost
You with experience and me fighting scars
Powerfully mismatched
We found abuse

I found you when I was lost
Kindness in spirit and soul
I could not keep up
We found stagnant air

I found you again
New circumstances and a new depth and fire
Like dry kindling we burned fast
We found time that cannot heal all

I found you when I was lost
A refreshing change of pace
A love fueled by summer air and peace
We found fall and winter and lost the path

I found me when I was lost
Grasping at the air
Clamoring to the surface
I found love, cycles, loss

I grew up overnight.
After eons of your name haunting me,
I heard my heart beat—for myself.

It felt like lightning.
My entire body stood still—
but I heard it.

Years of chasing silence
died down
like the mulberry tree
my dad planted.

I grew up overnight.
Conversations with you in my head
disappeared for an hour.
It was symphony.

To someone walking by,
it looked like a girl weeping
at the foothills of God.
To me,
I grew up.

Children rush past me,

I hold on to the edge, no --


longer a mother.

The black fabric clings  
to my dampened skin  
in this oppressive heat,
while the sun beats down,
indifferent to my grief,  
making my loss heavier to bear.

I wear this darkness  
on the outside now,  
while the emptiness of loss  
ironically thrives within.  
How strange it is that colours speak  
what words I dare not say.

Black is not just a colour,  
but the weight of something lost,  
the saddest shade, absent of light,  
offering no relief in return, 
as I long for cooling breezes
that I cannot feel.

In this attire of sorrow,  
I walk through sunny days  
as a contradiction,  
I am a gloomy shade  
amidst summer's lively scenes,  
wearing my grief on my sleeve.

©️Lizzie Bevis

When you’ve done enough
The sorrow will fade in the lack of clear thoughts and the beats of a broken heart will eventually stop

I twirl my umbrella.
Not over me, since I'm far from excited,
or happy.

I stepped out into the rain after work.

Opening it
I realized,

it had a hole,

and is now worthless,
but I would hate to let it go.

My grandmother passed it down to my mother and my mother gave it to me.

Before she passed.

A sad old lady,
stubborn and empty.

This umbrella reminds me of that.
A part of her I hated,
but can’t let go of.

She was still my mother.

And so I twirl it,
closed and hidden,
to my right.

The same side she laid on.
When Grim came near.
There, she stared at me
with her glossy blue eyes
and said her last furrow-browed “Hello”.