Unsaid

Villanelle

With all beloved gifts beside my bed;

a dark and haunting ache remains today,

for all the many words we left unsaid.

 

ill-fated hallmark letters lie unread;

though secretly one message stowed away,

with all beloved gifts beside my bed.

 

Dim nights of eerie silence filled with dread;

our quiet ravaged stillness fear’s foray,

for all the many words we left unsaid.

 

Last pages of a story nearly read;

a Whiter Shade of Pale on endless play,

with all beloved gifts beside my bed.

 

I’m left to wonder what may come instead;

to grieve we will not have another day, 

for all the many words we left unsaid.

 

Your picture in a frame here to embed;

a life now held in memory portray,

with all beloved gifts beside my bed,

for all the many words we left unsaid.

Author's Note

I lost my only sister to cancer 16 years ago. She spent the last month of her life with me, at home. Left behind on my nightstand after she passed away; an unfinished novel, the last CD she purchased, and a stack of greeting cards all bare but one. She had written in one telling me that she wished she would be there to celebrate my birthday (2 months later). I discovered it two days after she died. We spent many nights that month in silence; on my bed, together, ravaged, without enough words. The book, the CD, and the card, all remain in the nightstand beside my bed

Reviews

[SilentVerses]

A sorrowful rendition written with an emotion that drips from your words as they cry for you, I could feel it in my core harrowing and filled with a despair that ties a chord of desolation around the stanzas, the agony sings a melody of anguish that wraps around the reader, beautifully emotive.

[Ed Hart]

a tribute that echoes in every heart that passes by

[L]

Beautiful tribute in villanelle form. Wonderfully rendered in iambic pent; much emotion but no sense of mawkishness. No mean feat.

[haitianprincess]

I like.