Most nights right now, I’m living inside a story about the things we don’t say. I’m working on edits to a novel I wrote this last year about the unspoken things people carry.

Over the weekend, I saw my extended family too, which hardly ever happens anymore. There are so few of us left.

I think those two things together just reminded me how much love goes unspoken in a lifetime. How many beautiful and important things we save for later. How often we wait for the end of the story to finally say what the whole thing meant to us.

We assume there will be time. We wait. Until something reminds us not to.

Beautiful Things to Say….

People have beautiful things to say
about you,
but you have to die first.

Whatever it is that makes kindness
real in the world,
she was made of more of it
than most.
It was the loudest thing
about her,
a thunder made of mercy,
a riot made of light.

Whatever it is
that makes a person
feel like home,
she was built of it—
her presence like a small miracle
in a ruined chapel,
letting us know
that even broken places
can glow.

Whatever it is
that keeps a heart soft
when life bears its teeth,
it lived in her,
a fragile-fierce grace
that made a shelter of itself.
She loved with a gravity
that pulled us toward
our better selves.

These beautiful and true things—
the simple ledger of your soul—
the way you touched the world
like a hand
pressed to a fevered brow.
The love you left behind,
the holy residue of your living.
Every good thing that stays
long after you don’t.

Nothing more
than stories for the afterlife.
Because you know how we are:
we let one another walk this earth
with our glory unspoken.
We wait
until the story ends,
to say what it meant to us.

You mean everything to me.
My life is better
because you are in it.
I see the good in you.
I am lucky to know you.
I appreciate you.
I need you.
I love you.

People have beautiful things to say
about you,
but you have to die first.