Feeling Sad. Missed you quietly today...

Visited my husband Lonny this week in Memory Care. He's been there 6 months while I have been going through cancer treatment. He slept through lunch and didn't wake up to eat. I just held his hand and talked to him and told him I love him. They have him medicated due to agitation & because he fell the week before and had to go to the ER for 8 stitches in his head. I found this poem and it is exactly how I feel. I miss him so much it hurts. Trying to find things to do to occupy my time & mind. Just needed a hug today. Thanks for being here.

I missed you quietly today. So quietly that no one noticed.

I missed you as I climbed out of bed and as I brushed my teeth; when I waited at the lights on the drive into work and as I heard the rain outside my window.

I missed you as I ordered lunch and as I kicked off my shoes when I got home; as I switched off the lights and climbed into bed for the night.

I missed you without tears or noise or fanfare. But oh how I felt it.

I felt it in the morning, at lunchtime, in the evening and at night. I felt it as I woke, as I waited, as I worked. I felt it at home, on the road, in the light, in the dark, in the rain.

I felt it in every one of those moments, each one sitting heavier and heavier as the weight of me missing you kept growing and growing.

Yes, I missed you so quietly today.

But I felt it so loudly.

***Becky Hemsley Poetry 2024