Grieving through Poetry. Healing through Poetry. Moving on through Poetry. Starting over through Poetry. Let the pain in. Then let it go

“I could only be grateful when I realized that I would rather have known you for a moment than never at all. I would rather endure this inexplicable pain of outliving you than to have never seen your face, spoken your name. I would rather be yours, you be mine, regardless. Regardless of the sorrow, the sleepless nights, and the years I will walk this earth, carrying you in my heart.”

~ Lexi Berhndt, Scribbles and Crumbs

“There will come a day, I promise you, when the thought of your son, or daughter, or your wife or your husband, brings a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eye. It will happen. My prayer for you is that day will come sooner than later.”

~ Joe Biden

“To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die.”

~ Thomas Campbell

“When I think of death, and of late the idea has come with alarming frequency, I seem at peace with the idea that a day will dawn when I no longer be among those living in this valley of strange humors. I can accept the idea of my own demise, but I am unable to accept the death of anyone else. I find it impossible to let a friend or relative go into that country to no return. Disbelief becomes my close companion, and anger follows in its wake. I answer the heroic question ‘Death, where is thy sting?’ with ‘It is here in my heart and mind and memories.'”

~ Maya Angelou, When I Think of Death

“It’s so curious; One can resist tears and ‘behave’ very well in the hardest hours of grief. But then someone makes you a friendly sign behind a window, or one notices that a flower that was in bud only yesterday has suddenly blossomed, or a letter slips from a drawer… and everything collapses.”

~ Colette

“But there was no need to be ashamed of tears, for tears bore witness that a man had the greatest of courage, the courage to suffer.”
~ Viktor E. Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning

“Make the most of your regrets; Never smother your sorrow, but tend and cherish it ’til it comes to have a separate and integral interest. To regret deeply is to live afresh.”
~ Henry David Thoreau

“Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built of a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touches some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you’re there.”
~ Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

“Death ends a life, not a relationship.”
~ Mitch Albom, Tuesdays with Morrie

“And once the storm is over you won’t remember you how made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, in fact, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what the storm’s all about.”
~ Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore

“There are no happy endings. Endings are the saddest part. Just give me a happy middle, and a very happy start.”
~ Shel Silverstein.