The Weight of Your Words

My heart carries the weight of so many songs

You never wrote and I never heard you sing

Cut down much too young,

You had so many words and songs left in you

You had so many feelings you wanted to share

With me and with the world

But they are now just

Words and thoughts left unsaid and unshared

I will never hear them from your lips

Or read them from your pen,

But my heart feels and hears them every time

I look at your picture sitting next to my pillow

And when I hear your voice whispering in the winds

And rumbling against the shores of rivers and oceans

That you loved so much

That’s when I feel the love you wanted to tell me about

That you tried so hard to tell me about

And when the sun beats down on my shoulders

It feels like your arm is draped casually around me

But I can still feel the muscles underneath

That I know in a less than a second would tighten and pull me close

If you needed to protect me or show the world, I was yours

I am yours

Yet, the weight of the unsaid words haunts me

Baby, it is not a burden

Even though the melancholy is so overwhelming at times

Late at night when only the moon is around to

Keep me company

My heart carries the weight of so many songs

You never wrote and I never heard you sing

-Julie O’Hara 2023