the one who is left behind when the light goes out

Retrospective - lessons learned too late

I have found how hard it is to lose one’s life,
The small things which I took for granted,
the infinite daily subliminal expectations,
how things used to be only noted by their absence.
Every minute, every hour I become more aware
How unappreciative habit had become
The repetition blunting the edge of gratitude
Making commonplace the extraordinary.

And unexpectedly the chasm looms,
Gone is the author of my life’s even tenor
The ache becomes deeper than the sea,
wider than the horizon, higher than the sky.
And now all these things that teemed with humanity
Have no substance, are lost, alone, empty
How could I know that when she left
She would take the whole of me?

All these years together, how I drifted into complacency
Knowing that our lives were drawing to a close
I made no allowances, carried on unfeelingly.
Then suddenly she was gone, fled this life
I did not think that I should be the author
and that her life would end so violently
Like holding a robin’s egg sky-blue in my
Hand, clenching my fist – shattered inadvertently.

The remaining years are far too long suddenly
Life’s hopelessness stretching to infinity
Nothing is important, what can living mean to me?
Without her life is lost, never to return.
All of nature’s beauty is calling her name
Places where we once laughed and loved now
Weep in the wind and cry on the rain
The sun has set, she will not come again.