HOLIDAY GRIEF
The festive season,
‘the most wonderful time of the year’,
but if you are missing a face at your table,
it can be the hardest time of all.
How to feel merry, how to feel bright,
when your world has lost its light?
How to carry on, continue the traditions,
when the person who made it all worthwhile is not there?
How to face the music, the dancing,
the cheering and the reflection of a year gone by,
when the pain is already suffocating on an ordinary day?
You just try.
It is all you can do my friend.
You try, very hard, to imagine,
what that person would tell you,
and if you listen really closely
you will hear it in their voice.
What would they want you to do?
Retreat?
Isolate?
Or take their favourite songs
and their funny stories
and their little festive habits
and share it with your loves?
In their honour.
Now that they cannot.
I think we can all agree,
it is what they would wish for you.
I think we can also agree,
that they would want you to feel as loved,
as you once did when they were here.
They would want you to feel their love still.
They are trying very hard to make you feel it.
It hasn’t gone away.
And you need that love now more than ever,
and everyone around you needs it too.
So, feel their love, say their name,
bring them back to your festive table,
even if it takes all of your courage and heart.
It is the only way.
Donna Ashworth
Art by Tracie grim wood
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