I am trying to love life, to love it even
when the sunlight each morning is reflected
through the shattered pieces of my broken heart,
a prism of both pain and love.
Each day my body reminds me
that I am missing my other half;
I instinctually reach for you in bed,
my fingers met instead
with shockingly empty space.
There are days when my grief is insistent,
loud and furious, strong and heavy;
other days it is content to just be,
accompanying me as I move from task to task.
Just as I did when you were with me,
I look for the little things:
the changing of the seasons around me,
the cloud shapes in the sky, dog snores,
a cat stretching in the sunshine,
a conversation with a friend.
It is these little things that anchor me now,
because the big things in my life were taken.
I am forever changed by the intimate understanding
that the deepest love leaves us vulnerable
to the sharpest pain, and that control is an illusion;
two truths that now resonate in my bones.
Life and I have a complicated relationship right now,
but I am working to root it in truth,
love and grief, and all the emotions in between.
It is an act of self-care to accept
that loving life looks different now than before.