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Realms of Loss

Loss of a Loved One

I measure every Grief I meet

With narrow, probing, eyes – 

I wonder if It weighs like Mine – 

Or has an Easier size.

 

I wonder if They bore it long – 

Or did it just begin – 

I could not tell the Date of Mine – 

It feels so old a pain – 

 

I wonder if it hurts to live – 

And if They have to try – 

And whether – could They choose between – 

It would not be – to die – 

 

I note that Some – gone patient long – 

At length, renew their smile – 

An imitation of a Light

That has so little Oil – 

A line of headstones leading down to a chapel, surrounded by golden grass and bushes.

Loss of Freedom

A cell consisting of a small bed and a covered-up window, with an ominous red light shining through the bars.

Loss of Livelihood

The engine houses at Botallack, the site of a fatal mining disaster, are surrounded by deep red waves crashing against the cliffs.

I wonder if when Years have piled –

Some Thousands – on the Harm –

That hurt them early – such a lapse

Could give them any Balm –

 

Or would they go on aching still

Through Centuries of Nerve –

Enlightened to a larger Pain –

In Contrast with the Love –

 

The Grieved – are many – I am told –

There is the various Cause –

Death – is but one – and comes but once –

And only nails the eyes –

Loss of Heritage

There's Grief of Want – and grief of Cold –

A sort they call "Despair" –

There's Banishment from native Eyes –

In sight of Native Air –

 

And though I may not guess the kind –

Correctly – yet to me

A piercing Comfort it affords

In passing Calvary –

 

To note the fashions – of the Cross –

And how they're mostly worn –

Still fascinated to presume

That Some – are like my own –

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Emily Dickinson (1862)

I measure every Grief I meet

A seemingly precariously balanced, yet sturdy, ancient dolmen against a field of white grass and a dark orange sky.

Loss of a Secure Future

A line of white trees set in a field of white grass with a stark vermilion sky.
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