Lost Loved One Quotes

“Once heaven is done with grandma, we'd like her back, thanks.”
― Mitch Albom, For One More Day

“The dead sit at our tables long after they have gone.”
― Mitch Albom, For One More Day

“There has never been a poet able to heal with words, nor accurately express with phrases, the pain of missing a lost loved one.”
― Steve Maraboli

“The sketchbook was still open on the table and I rushed to it.
It was the one that Edward used over the summer of 1862. I had sat beside him while he made those very lines on that piece of cotton paper: studies for the painting he had planned, something he had been thinking about for years. On the following pages, I knew, were his sketches of the clearing in the woods and the fairy mound and a stone croft by the river, and at the bottom corner of one, in loose scratched lines, the heart he had penned, and the ship on the wide sea, as we spoke excitedly of our plans.”
― Kate Morton, The Clockmaker's Daughter

“If I could see you one more time,
I know just what I’d do.
Because all I’ve thought of since you left
Is one more day with you.

There are notes in every margin
About everything you’ve missed,
And with every passing day,
More gets added to the list.

I’d probably invite you
To do things simple and mundane,
Like walk to get a coffee
Or listen to the rain.

I’d talk about tomorrow
Like I know it’s going to come,
And for a few brief moments,
Everything would not feel numb.

I’d let you speak forever
And hear every word you say.
I won’t take it for granted,
Since I know you’ll go away.

I’d ask you all the questions
That I wish I’d asked before.
I’d tell you that without you,
I am not whole anymore.

I’d make sure that before you leave again,
You know the truth
About the very depths of the amount
That I love you.

Before we said goodbye,
I would hold you tight as ever —
The way you hold somebody
Right before they leave forever.

I’d say I’ll think of you
Every part of every day,
And you’d tell me it won’t be life
If I live it that way.

That you will be a part
Of everything I ever am,
That I need to move on
Instead of trying to understand.

And as our time ran out again,
I’d try to act real tough,
But no amount of time with you
Could ever be enough.

But I won’t see you just once more,
But again and again and again,
Because the day that I do not
Will mean I’ve found my end.

And even when that day does come,
I’ll see you that day, too,
Because the first person I’m looking for
Once I get there
Is you.”
― Josie Balka, Loves of Our Lives: Poems for hopeful hearts

“I Hope You Don’t Miss Me in Heaven

I hope you don’t miss me in heaven
as badly as I miss you here.

I hope, for you, the silence is peaceful,
and the thought of me feels like déjà vu—
a wave of familiarity
that you can’t quite put your finger on.

Empty for only a moment,
once in a while,
and gone like the wind after that.

I hope when you got there,
you were swept over
by a wave of forgetfulness,
so you’re still entirely full
of life and happiness,
but you can’t remember why.

And pieces of me are a part of you
in such a way
that you feel even more complete.

I can’t imagine heaven feels
how I feel without you,
and I hope it doesn’t.

I hope you yearn for nothing
and no one.

I hope there is no pain at all.
Maybe I am feeling both of ours at once,
and that’s why it feels this heavy.

If that’s the case,
it means you are with me,
and I’m okay with that.

I hope that in heaven, grief does not exist,
and I show up in your dreams on occasion,
and the feeling of having me near you
lingers with you through the morning
after you wake up.

I hope those are the same nights
you show up in mine.

And if, in heaven,
you can’t remember me at all,
I hope the wave of forgetfulness
that overtook you when you arrived
turns into an ocean of remembering
when we meet again.

Like we never spent a moment apart,
and I will forget
what it was like to be without you.

And you will never have known
what it was like to be without me.

Because you found the peace
I’d hoped you’d find,
while I found my way back to you.”
― Josie Balka, Loves of Our Lives: Poems for Hopeful Hearts

“*I’m going to miss you forever —*
*do you know that?*

I will spend the rest of my life
missing you
in big ways
and small ways
and medium ways—
in all ways.

I’m going to miss you.

There aren’t many things
that last forever,
but missing people —
it never, ever ends.

Even people
you shouldn’t miss,
or don’t want to miss,
or who don’t deserve
to be missed.

That feeling will creep in
like a robber on his tiptoes.
He’s in there
and there’s nothing you can do.

And it’s beautiful,
because I know
I’ll never forget
to keep missing you,
even when the spaces
between remembering
and forgetting
get longer.

But it’s awful, too,
because you only have to miss someone
when they’re gone.

Sometimes I’ll miss you
and I’ll know
that’s what I’m doing.

And sometimes
it’ll just be an emptiness,
or an ache
that creeps in.

And I’ll take a moment
to ponder what hurts
and where it’s coming from,
and my body will clue into
the difference between
the pain of a cut on my hand
and the grief
of you being gone.

And then I’ll remember.

And I’ll miss you then, too.

For all my days.
Not every day—
but in little pieces
until the end of time.

I am going to miss you forever,
and I find so much peace
and so much pain
in that
all at once.”
― Josie Balka, I Hope You Remember: Poems on Loving, Longing, and Living