When It Happens to You...A Poem by: Kinyatta E. Gray

When It Happens to You by Kinyatta E. Gray

When it happens to you,

You will remember the time I changed,

Became someone different,

The friend you stopped understanding.

When it happens to you,

You will feel the crushing blow,

The shattering of your psyche,

The irreparable cracks in your heart

That will never fully mend.

When it happens to you,

You will understand why some days,

I couldn’t get out of bed,

Why the curtains stayed closed,

Why the sunlight felt unbearable,

A harsh reminder of a world still spinning

When mine had come to a stop.

When it happens to you,

You will know why all I wanted

Was to hear you say,

“I love you, I care,

I will be here for you,

For as long as it takes.”

When it happens to you,

You will grasp why I spent

Every waking moment

Trying to remember her—

Her voice, her laughter,

The way she made everything

Feel like home.

When it happens to you,

You will understand why

I longed to sit and talk with you,

To share every memory of her,

To keep her alive in stories,

To hold onto the fragments

Of a love now lost.

When it happens to you,

You will want everyone

To understand the crushing pain,

The pain you couldn’t see in me

When my mother died,

The pain you failed to recognize,

The grief you couldn’t comprehend.

Now it has happened to you.

Your mother has died.

It has now, indeed,

Happened to you.

Kinyatta E. Gray is a Certified Master Coach, Grief Educator, Author, and Founder of The Heart of Miss Bee, Inc. Gray writes about grief and loss for women grieving the loss of their mothers. The Heart of Miss Bee, Inc. exists to honor the memory of the late Beverly E. Carroll, Kinyatta's Mother.