Hold tight on to the memory
Wrap your fingers in the pain
Pull it gently to you heart
So you can visit it again

Don’t let it overwhelm you
Just let it linger in your touch
Caress the photos in your sleepy eyes
The ones you want to recreate so much

Don’t run away from the falling tears
Don’t wipe them away with haste
May they pave a way far down your cheek
Touch your lips with salted taste

It is not just blackness around you
Don’t let it be all you feel
You are a Willow tree bending in the wind
not concrete and hardened steel

Embrace the darker moments
For they also enhance the light
Darkness can’t touch the butterflies
When they leap and take glorified flight

You are more than just a broken heart
Of battered memories
You are the smile upon your children’s lips
And the sparkle in their eyes.

Be bold and brave and fearless
Be a gentle summer breeze
And the grief will turn to whispers
while you again learn how to breathe

For Lori