TCF of SWMB - Poetry

I’m Here

I cannot ease your aching heart,

Nor take the pain away,

But let me stay and take your hand

And walk with you today.

I’ll listen if you need to talk

I’ll wipe away your tears.

I’ll share your worries when they come

I’ll help you face your fears.

I’m here and I will stand by you

Each hill you have to climb

So take my hand, let’s face they world

Live one day at a time.

You’re not alone for I’m still here

I’ll go that extra mile.

And when you find things easier

I’ll help you learn to smile.

WHEN....

when we finally realize that you

are always going to be smiling

and dancing in our hearts,

then, our pain shall turn to joy.

*Bob Walters

TCF/South Lake Tahoe, CA

Searching.....

Once again, my list has vanished;

it was here, but now it’s missing.

Keys and glasses disappearing;

books and letters—overdue.

I’m forever searching, searching,

they must be here, and I need them!

Could it be that what is missing,

what I want this very minute—

could it be what I’m really

searching for,

my child,

is you?

Joyce Andrews

TCF/Sugar Land, TX

“THE YEARS CONTINUE TO CHANGE YET THE MEMORIES OF OUR CHILDREN MUST REMAIN THE SAME”

GRIEF HAS NO TIMETABLE

“Like fingerprints or snowflakes, each person’s grief is different.

The depth and scope depends on your relationship with your loved

one the support you receive and your ability to cope with stress.”

THE ROOM JUST DOWN THE HALL

There’s a room just down the hall,

Where there’s never a sound at all,

But once these walls knew laughter,

And music from the radio.

There’s posters on the wall,

In the room just down the hall,

And love is all that lives here,

In the place that you called home.

On the bed where you dreamed your dreams

You were what you wanted to be —

A fireman and a cowboy,

Shootin’ straight and riding tall.

And I remember what you wanted to be,

When you grew up — just like me!

And the world was just like heaven

In the room just down the hall.

Now sometimes late at night,

By the flickering candlelight,

I find simple comfort,

Just lying on your bed.

I finally fall to sleep,

With your picture next to me.

And again my tears find freedom.

On the pillow where you laid your head.

Lying there in the night,

I know it’ll be all right;

I always feel you close.

I often hear you call,

From the place you now call “home,”

In the room you call your own.

Heaven again lies waitin,

In the room just down the hall.

Jeremiah Sundown

TCF/Nashville, TN

A HEART WEEPS

This is a level of loss
That numbs every part of my being
My heart is bound so tightly
That I cannot even weep.
Will this time ever end?

The ground lies bate and brown

Covered with last year’s leaves.

The earth is cold and hard

As desolate as my heart.

Sustain me in this hour!

Today, from that barren earth

A clump of green appeared

White snowdrops clustered there.

White snowdrops, clustered in the green

And I saw, once again, a fragment of beauty~

I weep with thanksgiving

For this beauty that has warmed me.

For this heart that leapt, and now knows

That joy can enter once again.

Those of you who are reading this in the first winter of your loss may be feeling so much of what these words speak. Those of you who are further away in time from those first weeks and months will no doubt easily recall the dullness and despair.

Meetings of The Compassionate Friends allow those who are newly bereaved to meet others who are at various places along the road to a resolution of their grief. There is so much understanding encountered between those who are The Compassionate Friends.

Marie Andrews, TCF

Southern Maryland Chapter

The Birthday Table

No rustling tissue paper scattered ribbons or burst balloons no shouts of Happy Birthday break the silence in this room

Nonetheless a birthday has rolled round again though the beloved children who reveled in the cheer no longer blow the candles out at the turning of the year.

Loving hands may bring a photograph of that precious life to share and place it on the birthday table

with utmost tenderness and care.

For though the world. may not recall the laughter or the joy we reassure every memory of our birthday girls and boys.

by Frankie Wilford

TCF, Carrollton-Farrners Branch. TX

Seasons transform as you awaken, fragrance untouched like the depth of the sea.