When my friends Keren and Steve lost their precious little girl a few years ago, Keren’s mum Judy wrote this beautiful poem:

O Natalie, Natalie the finality
Here on earth, that you went home
So soon.
We wanted you to stay longer
To share our journey.
We tried to protect you from harm, danger;
Difficulties,
But it came with stealth
Like a thief in the night
And took you home so suddenly, unexpectedly.
We were not ready.
How we loved you!
We saw your shell,
Your beautiful, pale, silent, soft shell
And knew it was not you
And knew you were not there
And knew that you’d gone home.
Yet we are raging, riven with grief
Wanting the life to return,
Wanting you to come back and join us.
So we carry on incomplete
Trusting our Guide on the journey
Who tells us He has gone before;
That you’ve gone to softer scenes,
That you’ve gone to gentler, greener glades.
We have you in our hearts
We have our memories
We have you in our mind’s eye
Constantly.
We see the reminders of you all around
And we are comforted
To have spent the time we did
To love you as we did.

Judy Grayburn, 2006
Reproduced by kind permission.