“I have a request to make of those who read Empty Shells. If any friend surmises he has discovered the author he will be courteous enough to keep my secret. I have left out a great many poems that would have betrayed my identity, and put in none that I have cause to fear. Why then publish? I have no right to count on a long life and I am not willing to be ‘edited, revised, and corrected.’ On the other hand, I feel towards my poems as many women do towards their weak children; and treasure them because if they were conceived in grief they healed my heart. After the first smart of a new loss was softened, next to writing my greatest comfort was reading; and I did not then seek great authors. Shakespeare, Milton, and Goethe were naught to me: I sought minor Poets — of whom I dare hope to be one. Could I but be a like comfort to some simple, sorrowing hearts I should feel my life-griefs had not been in vain.”
grief
Hard enough
If guilt or regret is an essential part of your grief, you will never stop grieving.
Endlessnesses
My grief is like a magician’s endless scarf — the more I let out the
Remains
Healing from grief is allowing the courage and purpose within you and the love someone else left you, to merge and create a new sense of being.
Wrought
Grief is processing what’s been taken from you, what’s still within you, and all the blessings and memories left behind by the one you’re grieving.
Reasonless
there’s no reason
grief and hope
can’t be friends
Agone
Love stabs at loss with pangs of past happiness.
Overflowing
whenever you lose a loved one
even though your heart feels empty
always remember that it is still full —
of love and thankfulness and memories