Grief Poems | Examples of Grief Poetry

Fading memories

Memories are like the delicate smoke in air,
Some are fresh and vivid, while some are fading slowly,

The intoxicating fragrance that is still alive,
While writing these twelve minutes have died,

Just yesterday white bloom was glowing under the twilight,
But now only one petal has been left behind,

Inhaling the smoke as they once were my sweetest memories,
But now

Great Expectations

Everywhere I look I see the effect
Of great expectations washed up 
On the shore of reality.

I know it’s a projection,
But I see it in the faces of everyone
From young to old, happy to sad
And know it is true for them too,
Whether they have accepted it
Or are still rejecting it
Caught in arrested development 
In some stage

Towering Urn of 911

Towering Urn of 911

ashes
scattered

Tea Talk

Ten in the night. The porch light flickers on, like a lighthouse in rural darkness. Healing begins with a door left open. An old lady at 90 sets the kettle to boil, chamomile steeping in amber pools of hope. The wooden sign leans against her window: Tea & Talk. Always Open to Anyone.

Seven nights of

Charming Thinker

Come to terms with loss,
for the reality that awaits you is
unforgiving as it may without yield.
Withholder from the bleak truth.

Doubt listening sat weighted,
claiming with measurable vigor.

Not one person awaits behind
the a gatefold in porcelain white.

If, Oh!
Only a branch held upon it a universal threshold.
A seismic energy wavelength maintained,
transmuted from a bubbling something
to a nothing absolute.

Room

Those Who Mourn

There is an ache deep in my core.
I don't think I can go on anymore.
It stops my lungs, my breath it severs 
I try in vain to hold it together

with weary arms wrapped around my middle,
I rock myself, like when I was little

The Great physician can heal 
His power, these miracles are real
Broken hearts or

Ten Years Of Tears-TSF

Ten years
Of joy
You gave,
Before
Death’s bell
Was struck
So fast.

Ten years
Since then,
Your love
Still blooms,
Yet I
Remain
Downcast.

Daddy,
I miss
Your laugh,
Your love,
And all
The care
You showed.

If tears
Could wake
The dead,
My God
Would grant
Prayers
I sowed.

The Dragon Weeping in her Bones

The Dragon Weeping in Her Bones

They say happiness is a flame,
brief as a match struck in rain.
I held it once—
a home, two sons,
a husband who smiled like promise.

Until his arms curled elsewhere.
Until his mouth tasted betrayal.
Until I learned beauty
was something I could not hold
no matter how tightly I bled.

The dragon woke in me that night.
Not

Does your Summer miss the snow

Foundation.

Does your Summer miss the snow?

A poem reflecting the persistent, almost seemingly never-ending, haunting nature of loss.

Exploring how bereavement can follow you—turning every place into a somewhere filled with old memories of someone special, whose absence still lingers.

Like Irish Sea Moss

The imagery of Summer missing snow represents grief in an eternal, kaleidoscope.

Relaying the sentiment that

The Beloved's Dominion

From all the fair ones thou hast stolen light,
And thou didst think upon thy captive's plight.

My heart was darker than the night so deep,
Till sudden light did chase the shadows' sleep.

A hundred strifes arose from thy bright eyes,
And suddenly thou didst sleep ’neath quiet skies.

From whom shall I seek cure, when all my pain is

The Alchemist's Lament

I spake: "Thy love's grief dwelleth in my core,
A breast brim-full with sorrows, evermore.

So long as in my head thy tumult lies,
Vain phantasies I bear, by nights, by sighs.

An hundred years have flown, yet not thy grace;
Save grief of parting, naught is my embrace.

In vigil lone, my heart with blood was stained,
By rival's tyranny, in

Derailment

Swallowed prayers
Faith abandoned at the station
I step off the train at its final stop
And find my chest hollow
No shadows soft enough 
To cradle a lie

Choice

You ask for a choice
Right or left
Up or down 
You demand an answer
Does it matter what is said
My choice is always wrong
So why do you ask
Especially when you do not want to know
How about you make it easy
Don’t ask for a choice
That would stop so much pain and save a lot of time
And maybe just

Expect the unexpected

Life changes come in little increments
along a fated journey fraught with twists and turns.

But once in a while
changes come on sudden and dramatic
like the day you passed away.

A fatal blow ~
the instant when I became unwhole
a widow
a casualty of love.

Leaning

As I navigate life after my son's suicide,
it is hard to answer the question "How are you doing?"
I am working, eating, sleeping, living, yet,
it doesn't feel like I am fully living
Life feels muted and dull and my emotions
are everywhere, up and down and in chaos sometimes
but most of all, I am not operating on my

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Poems Related to Grief

heartache, gloom, melancholy, pain, regret, agony, sorrow, heartbreak, mourning, discomfort, sadness, despair, remorse, bereavement, misery, woe, trouble, anguish, worry, unhappiness, grievance, distress, dole, affliction, harassment