HONEYBUNNY

In the stillness of the night, I search for you,   not in the familiar curve of our bed,   but in the emptiness that clings to my heart,   a hollow where your laughter once lived. They said the pain would soften,   that I’d learn to walk this road   with less sorrow,   with more strength.   But they didn’t know how your absence   would carve deeper wounds over time,   how the quiet would echo louder   as the years pass,   each one a marker of the love   I can no longer hold. I see you in our daughter’s eyes,   a glimmer of the smile you gave the world,   and it breaks me.   I want to reach out,   to pull you back through her,   to feel your arms around me,   just once more. The nights stretch long and lonely,   a sea of hours where sleep never comes easy.   But in my dreams,   you’re still here,   still mine.   I hear you whisper, “Honeybunny,”   the way you always did,   and for a brief moment,   I am home again. Then I wake,   and the grief washes over me,   a tide that pulls me under,   leaving me lost,   grasping for the warmth   that is no longer there. I wonder if you miss me too,   if you ache for my touch   as I do for yours.   Do you look for me among the stars,   whispering my name   the way I whisper yours in the dark? I miss you, my love,   with a pain that no words can soothe,   a sadness that stretches across the years   like a bridge to nowhere. But in the longing,   in the tears that never seem to end,   I find you,   still calling me your honeybunny,   still loving me   from the other side of this endless night.