Does death ever leave you wondering?
I don’t believe in a higher power,
but I hope the ones I’ve lost
are somehow still out there.

Because I can feel their presence linger.

I was only a child when I first met loss…
confused, breaking down,
learning as I went.
No one ever taught me how to cope.

He was my best friend,
lost in the haze of youthful innocence.
Our memories, late-night calls,
house visits,
even ding-dong-ditching,
now frozen in time.

As a teenager, I lost both paternal grandparents.
I didn’t know how to feel.
I never met them,
but I saw my mother mourn,
and her grief broke me.
They were in a distant country,
an entirely different world,
but somehow, their deaths
took a piece of me, too.

Early in adulthood,
my maternal grandparents passed away.
This loss cut too close.
It haunted me.
Their voices, their laughter,
echoing in every corner of my mind.

I replayed every moment:
Did I spend enough time with them?
Was I a good granddaughter?

Years have passed,
but their deaths still feel fresh.
It’s true, you never get over it.
You just learn to live despite it.

For my best friend,
I think of him at every milestone.
He never saw our graduations,
never went to college,
never met his baby brother,
never got to live.

For my paternal grandparents,
I wonder:
Did they have regrets?
What were their stories?

For my maternal grandparents,
their loss still feels like an open wound,
too tender to touch.

I haven’t made peace with their deaths,
Maybe I’ll never find peace.

But their love, their loss,

it lingers still, shaping who I am.