Sunflower🌻for Emily

The Silence He Left

Black fedora under stage spotlight with golden sparkles, symbolizing tribute, memory, and loss in a free verse grief poem.

He’s out of my life,
and the words taste bitter,
like something I never wanted to say.

I keep asking myself
if I held back too much,
or gave more than I should have.

The truth is...
I don’t know where the balance was,
only that love slipped away,
and left me holding silence.

He was part of my youth,
woven into the rhythm of my days,
and now the absence feels heavier
than the years that have passed.

He’s out of my life,
and I can’t pretend it doesn’t break me.

* This piece was born out of the song “She’s Out of My Life”.

Its mood has always stayed with me, carrying the ache of loss and the quiet questions that never find answers.

Back in my teenage years, his music was more than sound... it was presence, comfort, and a companion through growing pains.

Now, even as time moves forward, I still grieve.

I miss him, not just as an artist, but as a part of my youth that shaped who I became.

Writing this poem is my way of keeping him close, even in silence.

She carries silence
like a second skin -
hidden aches folded
between the laughter,
pains tucked beneath
the rhythm of her hands.
Her love is a language
without syllables,
a prayer whispered
into sleepless nights,
a sacrifice that blooms
in shadows, unseen.
The world sees her smile,
but not the weight
she trades for ours.
Her words unsaid
are the roots of our strength,
her quiet endurance
the shape of our tomorrow.
Today, we honor
the unseen,
the unspoken,
the unbroken.

When Silence Speaks

When breath dissolves into the air,
And time forgets the weight we bear,
What waits beyond the closing eyes—
A dawn, a void, or soft disguise?

Is death a cradle, rocked anew,
A birth reversed, yet passing through?
Do memories fade, or linger still,
Like echoes bending to the will?

The ones who cross cannot return,
Their lips are sealed, their voices burn.
Yet in the hush, a whisper stays,
A shadowed hymn of hidden ways.

Perhaps it feels like being born,
A gentle veil, a world reborn.
Or maybe silence, vast and deep,
Where souls lie down, at last, to sleep.

And though we ask, and wonder why,
No answer drifts from those who die.
So we remain, with hope and fear,
Listening for what none can hear.

~ Copyright ©EmperatrizV @Sunflower for Emily, 26 March 2026 - All Rights Reserved

Still Walking

AI generated image

I have walked through many seasons,
bare hands carrying bread and burdens,
a single flame in the dark,
a mother’s voice steady against storms.

I have known the silence of rooms
where laughter once lived,
and the ache of asking favors
that never find their way to lips.
Sometimes it feels as though
I am asked to walk until the end,
my footsteps fading into dust,
my heart still beating for those
who no longer need my arms
but whose futures I cradle in prayer.

I am not as strong as I was,
yet strength still lingers—
in the way I rise each morning,
in the way I hold my children’s names
like hymns upon my tongue.
Savings folded away,
memories stitched into years of labor,
I pause now,
freelance hours scattered like leaves,
wondering if the worth of staying
is measured in the love I give,
or in the quiet endurance
of a soul that refuses to let go.

God, I ask You—
let me remain,
let me see their paths unfold,
let me guard them a little longer.
I do not seek riches,
only time,
only the grace to stand beside them
until their roots are deep enough
to hold against the winds.

There are nights when headaches
press against my temples,
and tears blur the pages of my prayers.
Yet even in sorrow,
I whisper gratitude—
for the years already given,
for the chance to love,
for the strength to walk,
even when the road feels endless.

I am still here.
Not finished, not forgotten.
Still walking,
still praying,
still holding the future
like a fragile flame in my hands.

In the Silence of the Frame

We’ve never met—not in the way

the wind meets leaves, or hands find hands.

Yet through poetry and photographs,

I glimpse a world my heart understands.

A stranger bends to light and shadow,

capturing silence in golden skies.

I write of woods, dusk, and solitude —

his art responds, though unaware of my eyes.

His lens leans close to the effect of lights:

from the sky to waters, and the structures beneath.

I linger in the quiet spaces,

where admiration hides in gentle delight.

He knows I love the sun’s descent,

how it spills secrets across the sky.

And when I see that amber stillness,

I wonder if it speaks to me too.

No declarations, no confessions—

just verses left like fallen leaves.

And in return, his photographs

echo something my heart believes.

So here I stay, behind the screen,

where art and nature intertwine.

In the silence of the frame, I dwell—

a stranger moved, yet quietly aligned.

Christmas Verse of Grief and Grace

In the hush of December’s night,

I remember a chair left empty,

a voice that once carried carols,

now folded into silence.

Grief lingers like winter’s shadow,

yet even in sorrow’s chill,

a star breaks through the dark—

Bethlehem’s light,

eternal and unyielding.

For unto us a Child was born,

not to erase our tears,

but to cradle them in mercy,

to lift the weight of sin,

to promise life beyond the grave.

So I hold both ache and alleluia,

my father’s absence,

my Savior’s presence—

and in this holy paradox,

Christmas becomes not loss,

but love incarnate,

a dawn that death cannot dim.