Grief Is Just Love With No Place To Go

“Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love.
It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot.
All of that unspent love gathers
in the corners of your eyes,
the lump in your throat,
and in the hallow part of your chest.
Grief is just love with no place to go.”

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Ugh. My heart.

When I read this I came unstitched.

Last night, the sloppy mess that I was (again) kept saying “I can’t wait to bury my Dad” – who died in 2012.

So much grief.

So much left unsaid. 25 of my 40 years just wanting to talk about so much with him – all the conversations that never happened. And, in his final days, I had every intention of going to clear the air so we could both carry on with a clear conscience.

So he could take flight with no anchors or regrets.

So we could give each other the apologies we each deserved.

Apologies and acceptance.

It never happened.

Regret

“Looking back, I have this to regret,
that too often when I loved, I did not say so.”
– David Grayson

I did this self portrait about a month before he passed away. His entire life he raised birds – exotic & domestic – everything from pigeons to parrots.

Feathers and birds will always be symbolic of him to me.

I’m going to need to gather all of them over the next month to help me spread my wings.

There’s so very much that needs to be buried.