Fallow (A Poem, a Loss, and a Remembrance)

/ Katie

I’ve had enough of grief,
so today I’ll focus on love.
I won’t give time to that moment when you lose someone,
when you feel your chest collapse,
you go concave and hollow and you know that you’re alone.
Because I know love never turns to loved.
Gone isn’t lost.
That place in your heart isn’t empty.
It couldn’t be.
It’s just gone fallow, and only for now.
Soon, again,
it will grow.
It will grow new and alive and long, like bright yellow flowers
turned royal blue.
We become legacies
forever and forever and forever
and that love will always go on.

Graham’s sweet dad, Bill, my wonderful father-in-law and Lucy’s most beloved Papa, passed away on Saturday at 6:04 p.m., surrounded by his wife of 58 years and his two sons. It happened quickly, though he’d been dealing with some health challenged for a long time. Meg, Graham, and T sat with him until the end, and I’m glad of it. He loved them, he loved all of us, and he would have done the same. He carried kindness, joy, curiosity, creativity, warmth, and a friendly smile everywhere he went. He painted, and puzzled, and loved wine and travel, and swam in the ocean, and never stopped doing the things that mattered to him

He lived. And in his memory, we will, too. Every day. I’ll miss him. I’m grateful that I got to know him, and I’m grateful that Lucy will carry his beautiful legacy.

He was a good man.

32 thoughts on “Fallow (A Poem, a Loss, and a Remembrance)”

  2. ohhhh sweetheart. the heaviness of an august grief bears down. the loss is gaping. he looks soooo dear. i will never understand the looming sudden absence death gouges out of our hearts. sending love, in hopes it finds even a crack to seep in……

    and i love your wisdom in knowing you will never let love turn from present to past tense. xoxox

    bless you.

    >

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  3. Katie, this is a tender and heart-warming tribute, and I thank you for sharing this moment of your heart with us. You cannot help but smile back at him and his beautiful wife in that photograph of the two of them, and at the smiles of Graham, Lucy, and her Papa.

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  5. Katie,

    Beautiful tribute. I only met him a couple of times but I could tell he was a good father, grandfather, father-in-law and just a kind human. My deepest condolences to the family.

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