I am no stranger to the pain of loss

Having lost first at the age of five

A dear great grandmother that

Had lived a long and hard life

Before settling to her eternal rest

Too young to appreciate that loss

It quickly came again with a sting

A cousin not much older than me

By her own hand she left us to meet

The mother that she never knew

Not many years later more left us

Both my father’s parents found sleep

First my grandmother taken by disease

My grandfather followed, an old heart

He joined her exactly a year later

And more left, just a few years

An uncle adored by all and then

My mother’s father was faded away

Followed closely by a great-grandfather

Finally able to join his wife now long gone

But all this loss didn’t prepare my heart

For the greatest loss that I had known

For the day my father flew away to

The angels, my heart split into pieces

That I am still collecting seven years hence

Too soon after a brother was taken

At a young age with a wife and four

Children at home, taken by the hateful

Acts of wars, his loss reopened wounds

That hadn’t even begun to heal